Review: Tokyo Zodiac Murders by Soji Shimada

Synopsis: Astrologer, fortuneteller, and self-styled detective Kiyoshi Mitarai must in one week solve a mystery that has baffled Japan for 40 years. Who murdered the artist Umezawa, raped and killed his daughter, and then chopped up the bodies of six others to create Azoth, the supreme woman? 

With maps, charts, and other illustrations, this story of magic and illusion, pieced together like a great stage tragedy, challenges the reader to unravel the mystery before the final curtain. The Tokyo Zodiac Murders joins a new wave of Japanese murder mysteries being translated into English.

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It is 1979, and amateur detectives and friends Kazumi Ishioka and Kiyoshi Mitarai, investigate a baffling series of murders that was said to have occurred some forty years prior. Going back through events and documentary evidence, these two slowly piece together the mystery before the actual denouement is made by a surprising narrator.

A little bit long-winded for my liking but an intriguing and puzzling mystery none-the-less, and one that will keep the sharpest minds engaged.