The plot of Who Inside is a bit convoluted (even for a mystery novel) and it takes a fair number of pages become it becomes clear where it’s going, so bear with me for a bit. Who Inside begins with a mutual acquaintance of Moe and Saikawa, Setsuko Gidou, visiting Moe. Setsuko has a story she thinks Moe will be deeply interested in: she’s become internet friends with Marimo Kayama, a famous manga artist, through an Internet forum for puzzle-solvers. They met and bonded because they each have a similar puzzle consisting of a key that needs to be extracted from a vase with a narrow neck. Setsuko’s puzzle was bought as a souvenir from Europe, while Marimo’s puzzle is a Kayama family heirloom.
(As an aside, Saikawa dismisses Setsuko’s puzzle as a cheap trick, but the same solution can’t be applied to Marimo’s puzzle.)
However, Setsuko thinks Moe will be less interested in Marimo’s puzzle itself as much as the backstory: 50 years ago Marimo’s grandfather, Fuusai Kayama, died under mysterious circumstances with both the vase and the box the key is supposed to unlock at the scene.
Fuusai was a painter, and was found stabbed in his studio shed, which was locked from the inside and surrounded by a field of unbroken snow. However, no murder weapon was found. So, was this murder or suicide? Neither answer seems satisfactory. If this was murder, how did the culprit lock the room and escape without leaving any footprints? If this was suicide, what happened to the murder weapon? If this was a murder meant to look like suicide, why would the culprit remove the murder weapon from the scene? (A sliver of metal was found in the wound, so the answer is not an ice knife.) And what, if anything, did the vase and box have to do with Fuusai's death? The investigators just wrote off the incident as a suicide, but a truly satisfactory answer was never found.
As Setsuko expected, this ignites Moe's curiosity. A real-life locked room mystery that has been unsolved for 50 years! Fortunately for Moe, the Kayama residence is architecturally significant and not too far from her university, giving her the prefect cover to begin snooping. Unfortunately for her, the shed where Fuusai died was demolished during a renovation of the grounds, preventing Moe from directly examining the scene.
While some S&M books have a slower start, this one is interesting because it feels like Fuusai's death in the past is a main mystery, not just backstory. It is still backstory, though. It takes a while for the plot to move on, but move on it (eventually) does.
On Christmas Eve the Kayama family repeatedly tries to fetch Rinsui, Fuusai's son, from his studio shed, but the door is sealed and nobody answers. Eventually during one of the checks they find the door is unlocked—but all that’s inside is a massive bloodstain, the vase and the box. Rinsui's corpse is later found by a river bank down the road from the Kayama house.
So the question becomes: WHO was INSIDE the studio shed when they were trying to open it? If it was the culprit, what were they doing for hours inside? If it was empty, how was the room locked and unlocked? How and why was Rinsui moved? What was the murder weapon? How were the vase and box involved? And why does Rinsui's death echo Fuusai's?
The solution to the vase and box puzzle is extraordinarily cool, and by far the best part of the book. It felt like something out of a Detective Galileo story, but good. Detective Galileo stories typically hinge on an obscure science factoid that directly explains the main problem of the mystery. The vase puzzle of Who Inside also relies on an obscure science factoid, but it’s used as one part of a clever mechanism, rather than a final answer.
Everything else I could give or take. There’s an explanation for the deaths, and I suppose it works, but it felt a bit too reliant on coincidence (in particular, what one of the victims had to do between getting stabbed and actually dying just seems ridiculous), although I was more willing to accept coincidence here than in a typical story.
The motive was too Japanese to me, and I think that’s all I’m going to say on that matter.
There’s a clue involving an animal that’s used in a strange way. Animals are complex, sentient creatures! How can you really deduce and predict how they're going to act? The Kayama family dog gets implicated in the witness testimony, and the book goes out of its way to establish a very clear and explicit behavior pattern for the dog... and then the solution involves a completely separate, previously unmentioned behavior pattern. The behavior pattern wasn't unreasonable, but forcing the reader to make baseless speculation of an animal’s behavior to solve the mystery doesn’t it right with me.
A certain piece of evidence apparently manages to remain outside for weeks (perhaps months) without being disturbed, which also strained credulity a bit.
On top of the weird mystery, Saikawa and Moe's relationship progresses in a bizarre fashion this book. Their character dynamic and growth is a core component of the series, and while their relationship begins to crystalize, they also start acting horrible to each other. It’s just such a strange pivot from a relationship was was previously grounded on silly banter, and these developments were not enjoyable to read.
Also, in this book Moe becomes a senior and Saikawa officially becomes her advisor, which... seems like the absolute worst time to progress into an official relationship? Does nobody else find the power dynamics squicky?! I’m certainly not a stranger to bizarre relationships in mystery novels, but that doesn’t mean I have to like or get used to them.
I do like how the series progresses on a real timetable, rather than being frozen in a nebulous period. However, unless Mori massively speeds up the pace at which Moe and Saikawa stumble upon corpses, we can probably only squeeze in one more book before Moe graduates (while I know there are five more in the series), so I'm curious to see where the series goes then. For some reason I thought the 10 books spanned Moe's four years in college, but it looks like that's not going to be the case.
Additionally, after that disappointment that was “Jack the Poetical Private” (referring to the title, not the book, although the book wasn’t particularly engaging), Who Inside has a fantastic double-title. While I don’t usually give romaji of Japanese titles, I will in this case: fuuin saido. (If you don’t get it, say it aloud.) It means “Seal Again.” I already explained the meaning of “WHO INSIDE,” and while for most of the book that seems like the core problem, fuuin saido comes roaring in at the end. It’s a gloriously clever title for a gloriously clever problem.
Also, a cover that actually makes sense in the context of the story. Amazing!
There are some really good bits in Who Inside—the puzzle, the title—but they’re overshadowed by the weird parts. I think the mystery is worth experiencing, but perhaps not at this page count. I prefer novels, but I wonder if Mori would be better-suited to short stories… Who Inside would be a strange introduction to the S&M Series, but if you’re coming from the previous books I see no reason to stop your journey at Who Inside’s doorstep.
No comments:
Post a Comment