The novel opens with Lychee trying to wake Aikawa after a night of extensive... “business transactions.” In doing so, she discovers that Aikawa has a phobia of snakes, which leads to Aikawa explaining that he’s had a recurring dream involving snakes his whole life: he’s in a pitch-black room with two snakes. One is biting his stomach, while the other is approaching Aikawa—except the biting snake is a “good snake” and the approaching snake is a “bad snake.” As soon as the “bad snake” gets close enough to attack, the dream ends.
Lychee theorizes that the dream is the result of a traumatic experience when he was young, and Aikawa explains that he was attacked by two snakes as a baby. He told his mom about the dream in elementary school, and she told him that one day while out shopping while he was an infant, she returned to discover one snake in Aikawa’s crib biting him in the stomach, and a second snake on the floor, which presumably crawled in through the open window. That night, Aikawa overheard his parents discussing the need to tell Aikawa “the truth” and the fact that his father isn’t actually his father. Obviously this was a shock to Aikawa, who began drifting away from his parents, and eventually moved out as early as he could and became a police detective. (The emotional detachment also made it difficult for him to form meaningful relationships, but still seeks to fill the emotional void… such as by hiring prostitutes.)
Just from hearing the third-hand account Lychee is able to notice some odd points, and suspects that there’s more to the story than what Aikawa’s mom told him. And even if the story Aikawa’s mom told him was the full truth, it still didn’t explain Aikawa’s dream, as there were some discrepancies between them—for instance, the open window that the snakes presumably entered through let light into the room, while in Aikawa’s dream he’s in pitch darkness.
Aikawa resolves to get to the bottom of this, so he returns home to confront his parents. They readily admit that they had been lying, and provide the full story. It turns out that Aikawa was involved in not one, but two locked rooms involving snakes. (Probably not a surprise to anyone who looked at the title of the book.) The story Aikawa’s mom told him was the “second” incident, where the issue is how the snakes could have gotten into the room. The first incident occurred when Aikawa’s mom was pregnant with him. His mother and biological father were found in a shed, apparently suffering from snakebites—except no snake was found in the shed, and no slither tracks were left in the fresh mud around the shed.
So there was more to the story, but Aikawa’s parents still didn’t have the full picture (or so they claimed). Aikawa and Lychee team up to solve the case, and fortunately everyone related to the cases still lives or works near the two buildings where they took place.
The solution is insane. From conception to inception. The Lychee Kamiki series has never particularly cared for plausible solutions, but Twin Snakes takes it to another level. While there’s nothing that’s completely impossible, the solution requires multiple coincidences that each have a miniscule chance of occurring to all happen at the same time and interact in the exact right way. And yet the solution is so bold, and the groundwork laid so well, that I just can’t help but accept it, especially since it can be reduced to a stupid but amazing pun. Overall, I think Nobody Can Pass Judgment on Me is still my favorite Lychee Kamiki book, but I’d put Twin Snakes behind it.
Another part of Twin Snakes that I like is the focus on Aikawa. I think Hayasaka chose to focus the book on Aikawa because Hayasaka understands that Aikawa is the emotional core of the series. That might sound like a strange statement considering this review is the first time I've mentioned Aikawa on my blog, but I stand by it. He was introduced in Rainbow Toothbrushes (and retconned into ????????), and while he generally hasn’t been directly important to the plot, he’s the character that’s received the second-most development in the series, after Lychee herself.
The thing is, Lychee isn’t a person. She’s brilliant, irresistible, independent, and always in control. As far as we can tell, she has no family or other obligations. She’s in her line of work by choice and always has the upper hand, meaning she never needs to deal with the economic, physical, mental, or moral issues that an eighteen-year-old sex worker would normally encounter or raise (and, by extension, neither do we). She’s an idea devoid of humanity, and that’s what allows us to enjoy the Lychee Kamiki series as silly murder stories. While the stories feature explicit sex, Lychee is only concerned with the physical act; she only ever has sex for business or investigative purposes. After all, she isn’t a person, but a concept.
Aikawa’s character, on the other hand, at his core represents the dichotomy between physical sex and emotional attachment, and how those who long for the latter can try—and fail—to replace it with the former. The struggle for love and belonging is a central part of the human experience, and naturally results in us empathizing with Aikawa. That doesn't mean Aikawa is perfect as a person or a character, but he still makes me root for him despite his flaws and hope that he finds happiness.
I also appreciate the fact that Hayasaka’s writing is fluid and his plotting is streamlined. The problem is introduced, Aikawa hears his parents’ story, Aikawa and Lychee investigate the relevant places and people, the solution is revealed. Boom, done. While it’s not always clear at the time how a scene with slot in, looking back at the end it’s clear that Hayasaka didn’t waste a single scene. There are plenty of books I read where I like the idea but feel the page count could be halved, yet Hayasaka gives into no extraneous indulgences, which is extra impressive when considering how easily he could saturate the book with erotica.
A sex-based murder mystery series feels like something that could quickly devolve into erotica wearing a thin excuse plot, but Hayasaka manages to keep delivering stories that take the murder mystery format seriously while avoiding pointless smut. They’re absolutely ridiculous, but the sex serves the mystery, not the other way around. The Locked Rooms of the Twin Snakes has all the normal caveats of the series, but it’s another great entry if you’re a fan. Twin thumbs up.
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