The Perfect Outsider / 有限と微小のパン

They say don’t meet your heroes. Maybe that applies to books, too.

I always knew I’d read The Perfect Outsider, the finale to Hiroshi Mori’s S&M Series. Well, “always” is a bit of an overstatement. After I finished The Perfect Insider, the first book in the series, I knew I’d read The Perfect Outsider. I wasn’t sure about the intervening books, but the next two passed my test, so I dutifully proceeded through the series until we arrived here, and… I wouldn’t say I wish I hadn’t, but it was certainly a disappointing ending. For most of the book I thought it was fun and plot-focused with an interesting scenario, but Mori’s bad habits started creeping up again in the final third until the book culminated in an anti-climax letdown.

As a warning, the premise of The Perfect Outsider (and thus this review) has general spoilers for The Perfect Insider. I think it’s a bit of an “open secret” if you look at Mori’s works, but you’ve been warned!

Numerical Models / 数奇にして模型

Numerical Models is the penultimate entry in Hiroshi Mori’s S&M series and features a model (person) murdered at a model (toy) convention, but unfortunately falls quite short of being a model (paragon) murder mystery.

Switch Back / 今はもうない

The S&M series has always had a lot of character work and philosophical tangents, and while they sometimes felt a bit overbearing, they never intruded on the mystery plot too much. But in Switch Back it feels like Mori has really drank his own Kool-Aid. I don’t know if Switch Back is my least favorite S&M book, but it’s definitely in the bottom tier. While the mystery plot isn’t bad, it’s incredibly bare, leaving the rest of the page count to be filled by awful character work.

Replaceable Summer / 夏のレプリカ

In the opening paragraph of my Illusion Acts Like Magic review, I described how Moe met her high school friend Tomoe Minosawa, and then never mentioned Tomoe again, and you might have thought that was kind of weird. First, that’s exactly what Illusion Acts Like Magic does, so Mori was weird first. Second, I was going somewhere with that! (And so was Mori.) While Tomoe is never mentioned again in Illusion Acts Like Magic, her adventure continues in Replaceable Summer, the next book in the S&M series, which takes place concurrently with Illusion Acts Like Magic.

Illusion Acts Like Magic / 幻惑の死と使途

Illusion Acts Like Magic begins with Moe meeting her friend Tomoe Minosawa and going to a magic show. Saikawa was supposed to come as well (a date!) but backs out at the last second because Saikawa. Tomoe is Moe’s best friend from high school. For a long time Tomoe saw Moe as an academic rival, while Moe… had no idea Tomoe existed. But once Tomoe confronted Moe they became fast friends. Anyway, Tomoe doesn’t have anything to do with the rest of the book. At the magic show Moe receives an ad for an upcoming magic show at a local park, and that’s where the plot of the book really begins.

Who Inside / 封印再度

Who Inside is the fifth book in the Saikawa & Moe (or, as I prefer, S&M) series. It’s ten books total, so we’re halfway through! (…Ignoring the fact that I never reviewed The Perfect Insider on this blog.) Anyway, the S&M series has a heavy dose of STEM, which I’ve always assumed would result in mechanical and stuffy mysteries, but Mori continues to play around with structure and convention. While the book gets a bit weird and might be a fair deal longer than it really needs to be, the core trick is great and enough for me to view the piece favorably. (That sentence, coincidentally, can also serve as my Perfect Insider review.)

Jack the Poetical Private / 詩的私的ジャック

Despite its focus on STEM, the S&M series sure seems to have an aversion to formula. While the previous book broke the mold by moving from a lab to a more traditional manor, Jack the Poetical Private instead breaks free of the closed circle. Unfortunately this didn't quite work out, and Jack the Poetical Private is the weakest entry in the series thus far.

Definitely no underlying reason for that...

Mathematical Goodbye / 笑わない数学者

Mathematical Goodbye is a strange book. It’s different from the previous books in the S&M series (standing for the protagonists’ names, Saikawa and Moe, and nothing else). The main trick is exceedingly obvious from the start, quite similar to another book I’ve panned on this blog (link purposefully withheld), and there aren’t any secondary tricks to salvage it. Basically, this is the type of book I’d normally consider a waste of time… and yet I liked it a lot.

Doctors in Isolated Room / 冷たい密室と博士たち

Ah, nothing like some good ol' S&M, right? I'm obviously talking about Hiroshi Mori's Saikawa and Moe series. The series stars associate professor of architecture Souhei Saikawa and college student Moe Nishinosono and their run-ins with various scientifically themed murder mysteries. The first book in the series in the series is The Perfect Insider, but I read that before I began this blog, so we're going to start with book two, Doctors in Isolated Room.

Saikawa has a friend who works in their university’s extreme climate laboratory, and he invites Saikawa and Moe to watch them conduct an experiment. The experiment takes place in a special room that can be chilled to sub-zero temperatures, and can only be entered while wearing a special cold-resistant suit. Considering this is a murder mystery, I’m sure you can guess how the experiment goes...