11/2/22

The Blood-Red Herring: Case Closed, vol. 83 by Gosho Aoyama

The 83rd volume of Gosho Aoyama's Case Closed, originally published in Japan as Detective Conan, kicks off with the story that was setup in the previous volume in which Conan accompanied Masumi Sera on a case to a cottage in the woods – a place with a troubled, blood-soaked history. Fifteen years ago, a woman savagely butchered her cheating husband in one of the rental cottages and disappeared into the woods never to be seen again. And that gave rise to the rural legend of the Red Lady. Three years later, a high school student goes missing in the wood and her body is eventually dragged from a swamp alongside the murder weapon from the Red Lady case. More recently, the cottage has been vandalized with the color red. A "bushel of apples was thrown through a window, the water heater tank was stuffed with rose petals" and "red paint was splattered on the front door."

So there's more than enough to investigate at the cottage and vol. 82 ended with the discovery of a body in a hot tub filled with bright, shiny red tomatoes. The victim is one of the former class mates of the high school student, Satoko, who drowned in the swamp and they gather once a year at the cottage to commemorate her death. You already know there's more to that drowning than merely an accidental death and the possible motive is easy to anticipate, if you're familiar with the anime-and manga version of the shin honkaku detective story. But the whole story is not without interest, even if it has one or two weak spots.

Firstly, the hot tub murder presents Conan and Sera with an alibi-puzzle, of sorts, which has the appearance of an impossible crime, because nobody could have killed him without being noticed or hauled in "armloads of tomatoes" – not to mention "the dumbbells used to keep the body weighed down." And while the alibi is a tricky one, Conan and Sera see through it almost immediately. On the other hand, the alibi-trick is not one of the best nor most convincing that has featured in this series. I very much doubt (ROT13/SPOILER) gur obql naq gbzngbrf pbhyq unir orra pbzcyrgryl bofpherq sebz ivrj jura Enpury, Freran naq Fhzvxn purpxrq gur ongu jngre. I also thought the murderer unnecessarily littered the place with clues (ROT13/SPOILER) nf gur fbhaq bs gur inphhz pyrnavat ehaavat naq ohzcvat vagb jnyy jbhyq unir jbexrq orggre jvgu n fbhaq erpbeqvat rather guna cynlvat nebhaq jvgu n onfronyy ong, pneqobneq, fgevat naq ryrpgevp sna. Secondly, I really liked how Aoyama handled the plot-thread concerning the Red Lady and how she went from background dressing to suddenly interacting with the main plot. Thirdly, Conan and Sera bounce off each other nicely as their chemistry has grown.

Sera remains a mysterious presence in the series who has even more mysterious relatives and the story ends with her setting Conan up to find her phone. Conan sees a photo on the screen of "Sera with a little girl who looks like a relative." A very close relative like a sister, but Sera has only two older brothers and she has stated she not close to any other relatives. So who's the girl in the photo? Conan asked her in a text message and response, "my little sister is outside your territory." Interestingly, this volume ends with an excerpt from a booklet that came with issue 33 of Shonen Sunday Magazine in 2013 to commemorate the series 20th anniversary, which has 16 pages of interviews and behind-the-scenes artwork. One of the questions Aoyama answered, or rather dodged, casts a potentially illuminating light on Sera's story-arc. Sera is a died-in-the-wool tomboy and a running gag is her being mistaken for a teenage boy, which got me thinking when reading Aoyama's answer to the question (ROT13) ner gurer nal bguref va gur frevrf yvxr Pbana naq Navgn jub unir orra genafsbezrq ol gur qeht (“ng yrnfg bar znl fubj hc fbba”). So what if (ROT13) gur yvggyr tvey va gur cubgb vf npghnyyl Fren'f byqre qrgrpgvir oebgure jub fur'f nyjnlf pnyyvat be grkgvat. Whfg yvxr Pbana, gur oebgure zvtug unir unq n fvzvyne rapbhagre jvgu gur Betnavmngvba naq abj uvqrf nf n yvggyr tvey nf ur fpbhgf bhg cbgragvny nyyvrf. Nsgre nyy, vs Fren pna cnff nf n grrantr oblf, gur puvyq irefvba bs ure oebgure zvtug cnff nf n yvggyr tvey. Under the circumstances, it's arguably a better disguise than the Clark Kent glasses Conan is sporting. And it's the kind of mirror-like characterization Aoyama seems to like.

So, on a whole, a pretty good, solid story with an ending that nicely sets the table for the second story. Sera currently lives on her own at a hotel ("I was hoping to move in with my other brother... but he said no") and Serena invited herself, Rachel and Conan to come over to see how their friend is living. But the hotel has a famous resident guest.

Keigo Hiuri is a well-known romance novelist who experienced "a dip in popularity" a few years ago, but, since then, he has made a comeback with a popular, ongoing magazine serial crossing time travel with romance – entitled The Telephone, the Sea and I. Hiuri is currently working on the final chapter of that serial as well as putting the finishing touches to two other novels, which is why there are three editors impatiently waiting in the lobby. So decides to stage a little competition between the three editors and orders a ton of food with the promise, "I'll finish my manuscript for the publisher who eats the most." While the editors go to the living room to begin their Herculean task, Hiuri takes a bath to brainstorm and could not have left the hotel room without immediately being spotted by the editors. And that provides him with an unshakable alibi when his assistant is found murdered in the room directly below his.

Conan immediately catches him in a mistake ("...how'd you know she was killed while you were writing?"), but his alibi proves to be a tough nut to crack. Hiuri was on the 30th floor and could not have climbed down the balcony, because it's visible from the living room where "the editors were pigging out in." However, the story had enough clues and hint to (roughly) work out how it was done and the solution hinges on a plot-technique that has come to fascinate me ever since Christopher Bush rekindled my interest in the manufacturing of alibis. A plot-technique that is to the unbreakable alibi what the replacement in time-and space technique is to the locked room and impossible crime. Having only one central puzzle intertwined with Sera's story-arc made for a much better, tighter plotted story than the previous one.

The third story is very minor stuff, but kind of stands out for its slightly unusual premise and take on the who-of-the-three type of detective story often used in this series. Conan and the Junior Detective League bump into a man who drops large bags of weeds as well as an old notebook filled with coded messages. Yeah, these language-or locality based code crackers rarely work in translation and tend to read them without trying to play armchair detective, but Ho-Ling says people who have visited Japan might have "a good shot at solving this case." So there is that. Harley Hartwell also makes an appearance, but only because the story and particular the ending needed him to be there to work. Other than that, Harley's presence felt wasted on such a small, ultimately inconsequential case.

Traditionally, the volume ends with the first chapter setting up a story that will be concluded in vol. 84. This story is a flashback case, or prequel, set shortly before the events in vol. 1. – which turned Jimmy Kudo into Conan Edogawa. Jimmy and Rachel were one of their deadly dates at the aquarium when someone is stabbed to death. Jimmy knows the victim was "stabbed by somebody in this aquarium," but when Rachel asks how can be so sure he unhelpfully replies, "the smell." And that's where the chapter ends.

So, all in all, vol. 83 is a huge improvement over the previous volume, which ended up being one of those rare disappointments in the series. This volume opened strongly with a slightly uneven, but good, detective story complemented by the ongoing story-arcs. Something the second story improved upon and the third story no doubt is a lot better in Japanese. I was entertained and eagerly look forward to the next two volumes!

9 comments:

  1. I remember this as a fun volume on its own, but it's definitely the following two volumes that you should be looking forward to. And oh man, clicking on that link to my blog I see this volume was released back in 2014, together with the last proper Detective Conan mystery adventure game on the 3DS. Has it been so long since they last released an actual adventure game of Conan... *sigh*

    Oh, and something that may or not may not interest you: I am expecting a package tomorrow or the day after with three of the four original novels of Spiral: Bonds of Reasoning. Written by the original writer, and one of those volumes is especially well-received apparently, some even calling it the best Spiral story period.

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    1. Spiral: Bonds of Reasoning? Now there's a series I've not thought about or looked at in a while. I'm absolutely interested in those four novels, but something tells me I've to wait a few months to a year for your reviews to even get a glimpse of them. Because it would be a little convenient if translations were readily available.

      Fortunately, mastering the art of delayed gratification comes with being able to enjoy GAD fiction, especially the obscure ones.

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    2. I had the whole manga series complete in my bookcase for like a decade, but funnily enough I only finished it relatively recently, in 2020, so it was still "fresh in my mind." But i have also been enjoying Invented Inference AKA In/Spectre a lot by the same author, so it was mostly a matter of time for me to get these books (which have arrived safely now, so gotta see when I'll get started on them...)

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    3. ^Oh, err, probably obvious, but that was me.

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    4. I'm looking forward to your review. By the way, do you know of any other mystery novels, like those four by Seimaru Amagi, that were translated into English as an educational tool for Japanese students?

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    5. There were a few, though I am not sure if there's a handy list. I for one have an English translation of Three Sisters Investigate by AKAGAWA Jiro, and the second Boys Detective Club book too (with gorgeous cover art by Amano of Final Fantasy fame!). I think there's at least one other Akagawa one...

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  2. TomCat, this is very silly, but someone in the Detective Conan fan Discord challenged me to "a mystery write-off" in which we both have to write a Detective Conan fan-case based around a theme chosen by a third party. The theme that was chosen was "The killer's plan must incorporate Conan's gadgets in some way".

    I tried to make the set-up sound authentically like a 6-chapter long-form Conan case, but I'm worried it ended up feeling too Kindaichi-esque... And then I thought there'd be nobody better to ask than the man who loves Detective Conan and hates Kindaichi Shounen more than anyone else I know! So I'm really sorry to bother you with this, but I wanted to hear your thoughts on this set-up I'm pretty excited for... for a case called "The Lovers' Rose Murder Case".
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    It focuses on a romantic, floral-motif mansion known for its romantic history of love and tragedy. The original owners and builders of the Lovers' Rose Manor were a husband and wife, and the sole remainder of their heritage is a rose-shaped jewel said to forged from the blood of the two lovers when they took their own lives to escape persecution for their love. The jewel is to be kept in the center of the home's atrium, where it is to be presented to your partner as a symbol of your everlasting devotion to one another.

    ...The current male owner of the Lovers' Rose Manor, Hananaka Shiro, has summoned Kogoro Mouri, the Great Sleeping Murder, most famous detective in Japan, to investigate the recent death threats he and his wife have been receiving, as well as to figure out the whereabouts of the man's wife, as she has recently disappeared! The death threats are addressed to Shiro's wife, Hananaka Miyuki, from a person enigmatically calling himself "The Baron of Broken Hearts". Hananaka has recently been the target of multiple failed murder attempts, and this is all frightening him for the safety of his wife!

    Kogoro Mouri successfully solves the case and falls asleep to begin his deductions to reveal the truth behind the affair, but the denouement is cancelled when everyone in the house reports being violently ill and unable to attend the deduction...

    While Kogoro (Conan) wonders about what this complication means for their now apparently incorrect deductions, a shocking discovery takes place...

    The fans in the atrium had been shut off two hours earlier, leaving a pile of blood-red roses that had remained undisturbed the whole afternoon. When the fans were fixed and turned back on, the airflow caused the pile of roses to shift, revealing the arm of a corpse in the atrium! As soon as all of the witnesses rush into the atrium, they remove the rest of the roses to reveal the murdered corpse of Nagato Aina, close friend of the Hananakas...

    Nagato was last seen alive at 2:00 PM, and the pile of roses that hid the body was first noticed at 2:30 PM, meaning Nagato Aina had to have been murdered in that time, and yet... all of the suspects have airtight alibis from 2:00 PM and 2:30 PM! And the corpse couldn't have been faked, because everyone's locations were accounted for at the time of the discovery of the body, meaning the corpse was certainly always in that pile of roses and never moved...

    But what's more telling than the alibi is the state in which the body was found. Nagato Aina was found wearing Hananaka Miyuki's clothes, wearing her hair like Hananaka Miyuki's hair, and was stabbed through the heart with the sharpened edge of the Lovers' Rose jewel, which pinned to her now destroyed heart a letter of obsessive love for Hananaka Shiro, signed... "The Baroness of Broken Hearts".

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    1. First of all, I don't hate Kindaichi. Just not a big fan of Kanari. Secondly, I suppose you find the problem too similar in presentation as the one from The Undying Butterfly, but miraculous materializing bodies have turned up before in this series. I remember vol. 80 has a story in which a body impossibly appears in a locked chest filled with apples. Thirdly, if the story has the murderer account for Conan's gadgets, no matter how good or bad, the trick is always going to play second fiddle to the question how the murderer learned about the gadgets. And how much this person knows about Conan's identity.

      It would actually make for a great story to have a standalone case involving unconnected to the main storyline, but still involves Conan's secret identity and gadgets. Somebody who quietly followed Richard Moore's career from the shadows, connected all the dots and decided to use the detective's bag of tricks to try and get away with murder. It can even be used as an escape plan. Early in the series, Conan expressed his disapproval of murderer's committing suicide and detectives given them that option. So when Conan confronted the murderer in private, there's an uneasy, silent standoff as they both know each other's secret and nobody knew what exactly to do about it. The murderer tells Conan there's only one thing to do and pops a pill in his mouth. Conan horrifyingly think he swallowed a deadly poison, but is even more horrified when the murderer transforms in front of his eyes into a kid! What can Conan do except let him go and keep an eye on him as the police is hardly going to arrest a child for a murder that could have only been committed by an adult.

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    2. My issue was more the killer sending notes under a grandiose alias -- "The Baroness of Broken Hearts".

      You're right that it would be hard to explain if the killer were KNOWINGLY taking advantage of Conan's gadgets, but in this case I found a workaround where the killer creates a fake mystery for Kogorou Mouri to solve in order to bait out the Sleeping Mouri to use the Sleeping Mouri's sleeping body as part of a trick. In this instance, the loophole is he's technically taking advantage of Conan's gadgets (but unknowingly). The solution is actually fairly lame and one of my less interesting ones, and basically rehashes Naniwa Swordsman but with Kogorou Mouri covered in leaves. It's not a great solution but "taking advantage of Conan's gadgets" is a difficult theme to write for,


      I also absolutely love the concept for your case and would probably work a lot better in the actual Conan manga, I'd love to see a killer use the kid-ification poison to establish an alibi too!

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