Shudder of the Mailer Daemon / メーラーデーモンの戦慄

Shudder of the Mailer Daemon is the final book of the Lychee Kamiki series about everyone’s favorite high schooler prostitute detective. It’s probably the weakest novel of the bunch, but a fitting finale to the series.

The Locked Rooms of the Twin Snakes / 双蛇密室

The Locked Rooms of the Twin Snakes is the fourth book in the Lychee Kamiki series starring the titular high school prostitute detective, and I think it’s the perfect entry to read in the Year of the Snake. The book explores the past of Hiroshige Aikawa, a recurring character from the previous books that’s a policeman and one of Lychee’s clients. Other than the hardcore sex scenes, this book provides basically exactly what I’m looking for, with a wild but well-clued solution and a streamlined investigation with basically no fat to cut.

Nobody Can Pass Judgment on Me / 誰も僕を裁けない

I’m fairly certain the title of the book is meant to be a defense against reading erotica in public…

Anyway, Nobody Can Pass Judgment on Me is the third entry in the Lychee Kamiki series, and my favorite so far. One day Lychee, our high schooler prostitute detective heroine, receives a package with a maid outfit and a letter from a man named Touzou Sakai requesting to hire Lychee as a live-in maid for the first week of May. Lychee has never heard of him before, but an internet search reveals that he and his brother run a massive machinery business—in other words, he’s filthy rich. It’s an odd request and Lychee isn’t sure whether she’s actually being hired as a maid or if that’s just a cover to take in an escort, but Lychee can’t resist the allure of cold, hard cash. So she goes to the Sakai estate and is hired as a maid—but it’s clear from her interactions with Touzou that he didn’t actually send the letter. The letter had Touzou’s personal seal, so it must have come from someone in the house. Lychee resolves to get to the bottom of this strange situation—but the next morning one of Touzou’s sons is discovered murdered in his room.

Rainbow Toothbrushes: Refractions of Lychee Kamiki / 虹の歯ブラシ 上木らいち発散

Returning from The ???????? Murder Case, Rainbow Toothbrushes features high-school prostitute Lychee Kamiki as she screws and deduces her way through an assortment of lewd cases. In The ???????? Murder Case, Kamiki functioned almost like a side character (until she started having sex with everyone and solving the case), but in this short story collection both Kamiki and the lecherous subject matter are presented front and center.

The ???????? Murder Case / 〇〇〇〇〇〇〇〇殺人事件

That is not a mistake in the post name!

The central gimmick of The ???????? Murder Case is that the true title has been hidden, and you're supposed to deduce it from the story. Trying to deduce the title is a novel idea that... doesn't really add much to the book. While the title gimmick and actual plot were fun enough for The ???????? Murder Case to become the 50th recipient of the Mephisto Prize, I don't think it's the right book for everybody.