The 46th Locked Room is a murder mystery by
Alice Arisugawa told from the point of view of a character also named Alice Arisugawa, but not
that Alice Arisugawa. Many Japanese mystery authors have multiple series and Arisugawa is no exception, except the narrator character in both is name Alice Arisugawa. The narrator of the Arisugawa books I’ve read so far is a university student, and so the series is called the Student Alice series. The narrator of the other “Alice Arisugawa” series is a writer of mystery novels (just like real-life Alice Arisugawa), so it’s called the Writer Alice series. And if that wasn’t confusing enough, in the Student Alice series the narrator is the author of the Writer Alice books, and in the Writer Alice series the narrator is the author of the Student Alice books.
I’ve enjoyed the Arisugawa novels I’ve read so far, and it seems that the Student Alice series is expected to have five novels, but Arisugawa has been sitting on four for almost two decades at this point. The Writer Alice series, however, keeps getting new entries. So I was very eager to see exactly what the books that have been delaying the final Student Alice novel was like! And, to be frank, I’m not impressed.
