The New Mystery Lovers' Club / 013
Chapter 1: Maangap / 045
Chapter 2: Prophecy and Foreknowledge / 145
Chapter 3 Mutual Surveillance / 239
Chapter 4: The Lost Hiruko / 343
Chapter 5: Face the Weapon / 451
The Prophecy of the Final Detective / 503

● The charm of a full-fledged mystery

Full-fledged mysteries, represented by whodunit, howdunit, and whydunit (who, how, and why did the incident occur), are the true flower of mystery among various mystery genres.
The Sherlock Holmes series by Arthur Conan Doyle, which is well known to most people around the world, the novels by Agatha Christie, who wrote And Then There Were None, and the British and American mystery novels of the 1920s and 1930s, which were called the Golden Age of Mystery, are all true mystery novels.
The authentic mystery novel was reborn in Japan in the 1990s as a genre called Shin-honkaku Mystery, and authors familiar to Japanese mystery fans, such as Yukito Ayatsuji, Arisugawa Arisu, and Shogo Utano, are considered representative of the Shin-honkaku genre.
Closed circles, locked rooms, and serial murders are elements that often appear in full-fledged mystery novels. If you like these, you'll be familiar with the plot and direction of "The Poet's Murder," and the sequel, "The Murder of Maangap," also follows suit.
A group of people gathered in a remote building in a rural village are isolated for some reason, and a series of murders occur inside.
The author, who said that he had “never really been into full-fledged mysteries” and that he simply wanted to write “mysteries that I had never read before,” unfolds the essence of a full-fledged mystery that surpasses his previous works through “The Murder of Maangap.”
In 『The Murder of the Poet』, he showed off some surprising physical tricks, but the way he pulled them off was almost like a rookie's rawness. In contrast, 『The Murder of Maangap』, the story is told in a more sophisticated and refined way.


● The form of mystery pursued by the author

It is illogical to deny something just because it does not fit with conventional wisdom.
(Page 199)
A true mystery is a story told solely for the sake of a trick, and is therefore often criticized as being artificial and devoid of substance.
Another limitation of true mystery is that it is not easy to come across a novel trick because so many works have already been released.
As if to overcome this, the author, who challenged the limits of a true mystery by introducing supernatural elements in 『The Murder of the Poet』, introduces a supernatural element in the form of supernatural powers in 『The Murder of Maangap』.
The author, who has created a world of the work that lacks realism and becomes a supernatural world by introducing an old prophetess who claims to have never been wrong in her prophecies and a high school girl who draws pictures of what will happen in the next few minutes, disarms the mystery of the murder case with logic in a way that is easy to understand.

“I don’t believe in the existence of superpowers, but if it’s true that Sakimi-san participated in the Madarame Institute’s research.
In response to Genzaki's statement that "we can't say for sure that such an ability doesn't exist," Hamura asserts that "it is illogical to deny it just because it doesn't fit with conventional wisdom."
This is also what the writer says while working on his work.
While mysteries featuring supernatural elements have often been featured, “there have been many cases where detectives have revealed that they were actually frauds or had scientific basis.
Couldn't we write a work that brings the occult into our world and solves it as a true mystery rather than suspense?
“That’s the type of mystery I’m aiming for,” the author says.
The author, who also said, “I didn’t plan on writing a sequel,” explained that the reason he included an ending that hints at a sequel in “The Murder of the Poet’s Market” was because “I have resistance to the world of the work being concluded in one book.”
The author, who said, “I wanted to leave room for readers to imagine what will happen in the future,” expanded that room for imagination even further with “The Murder of Maangap.”
This series, which boasts a cumulative sales of 800,000 copies including 『The Murder of the Poet』 and 『The Murder of Maangap』, is drawing attention to what kind of story it will tell in its next installment.