BOOK OF THE WEEK
NEWCOMER by Keigo Higashino Little, Brown, £13.99, ebook £7.99
THE first English-translated Detective Kaga book, Malice, was well-received as Kyoichiro Kaga joins an illustrious list of much-loved fictional detectives.
The understated Kaga makes a habit of surprising witnesses and suspects alike, as they often fail to realise his unassuming, dressed down character, far removed from the metropolitan murder squad detectives, is a cop. He is demoted and transferred to Tokyo’s Nihonbashi
the body count starts to pile up.
The bloodthirsty account of his reign and those that follow is a heady mix of violence, death and intrigue with lust and incest thrown in.
Among the litany of death, there’s no shortage of births either, and it soon becomes hard to keep track of exactly who is who. Most fans will love this fantastically precinct where he is tasked with working on a murder case.
A box of traditional sweets that leave an odd taste at the crime scene is enough to pique his interest, and ours. As he closes in on the killer, we accompany him on a tour of the city’s Nihonbashi district in a perplexing and enjoyable journey of discovery through Japanese culture, relationships and daily life.
The plot is as intricate and delicately poised as an antique three-sided clock Kaga encounters during his investigations. A charming, evocative and rewarding read.
detailed history of who killed, or sired who in the 300 years before the current GOT story.
Martin is as concerned about his obsessive fans about the delayed, looming finale in the main series and admits he’s under pressure to create something special. But if Fire and Blood is anything to go by, the final verse of A Song Of Ice And Fire will be worth waiting for.
Harvill Secker, £14.99, ebook £9.99
INTAN Paramaditha is a Sydneybased writer with a stack of literary awards in her native Indonesia.
This collection of bold, visceral, and sometimes brutal short stories shows women who have moved beyond the constraints of stereotyping and stale convention.
The Blind Woman Without A Toe is an unvarnished retelling of Cinderella (Sin), with the ugly sisters of yore hacking off bits of their feet to try and fit the glass slipper.
Blood pointedly juxtaposes the simple reality of menstruation with the taboos of religion and the fantasies of advertising.
In Doors, a disaffected socialite couple do battle to the death over a young lover. Ugliness is reframed and the marginalised redeemed. Women constrained by stifling societies find new avenues of escape or subversion, and inflict fierce revenge on orthodoxy and chauvinism.
Brittle, bloody, brave.