Reviews with content warning for Classism - The Honjin Murders

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The Honjin Murders by Seishi Yokomizo

8 reviews

epeolatri's review against another edition

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dark mysterious sad fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

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aseel_reads's review against another edition

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mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.0

This had potential, but it turned out to be quite boring and the motives behind it were low-key problematic... Sad times, was excited about having a new mystery author to read but I think I'll pass

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readingwithcoffee's review against another edition

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challenging dark funny mysterious sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

A little convoluted but an obvious love letter to other mystery books in overt references. It contains spoilers to the murder mysteries The Mystery of Yellow Room and The Problem of the Thor Bridge (this one I know is a Sherlock Homes one).

There is some violent misogyny in the book but I would not say it was ever condoned by the book. I said the book was diverse bc while the cast is entirely Japanese and largely one family there are two disabled characters. One with an intellectual disability and another with a stammer.

At times the writing was pretty convoluted and while I was able to guess and follow a long for the most part and tell what was meant to be a red herring I can see why some reviewers find that frustrating. I do think the book does a lot of telling vs showing unfortunately that I hope decreases in his other works.

That said there is a meta quality to the book that I found Sometimes interrupted the flow of the book but I think someone might find endearing of the author or very annoying even if I was more in the middle and it some what reminded me of “The woman in the Library” by Gentil even if that wasn’t outright the author interrupting the book and more smooth and interesting to me personally. I would consider giving the book a shot if you like murder mysteries!

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bookedbymadeline's review against another edition

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mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

The Honjin Murders by Seishi Yokomizo was this month’s book club pick and I’ll also be using it for my reading the world challenge for Japan!

There are a lot of characters to keep track of that could be confusing. And sadly we don’t get much of a look into each character, they’re just sort of there as background/plot devices. I think it’s because the storytelling style is detached, and written from the perspective of the author telling us the story as it happened ten years earlier.

This was a quick read, and felt very similar to the detective style of Benoit Blanc in Knives Out (could be because I just watched Glass Onion) 😁 You never really know who it is and the detective takes all the info over the course of the story and finally ties it all together to reveal how the crime was committed in one big monologue! I kind of wish there was more insight into some of the information that was only mentioned once the solution was given to us, instead of lots of info dumping throughout.

I did enjoy getting a glimpse into parts of Japanese culture during the early 20th century!

Overall a quick and easy read that was fairly enjoyable. It follows the typical murder mystery/detective novel so it’s not really anything unique in this genre, especially since it often mentions other novels that inspired the twists. I should note that I’m not a big detective novel fan so if you enjoy them, this could be a perfect book for you!

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