Battle-tested project leader at a PR firm and slippery bachelor, Sakuma sees himself as a player. His smug self-regard doesn't seem entirely unfounded, both in love and at work. When is idea for a mini-theme park is dismissed as too costly and vacuous at the last minute by a major client he seems to have met his match.
Katsuragi, an heir and executive at the global car maker, Nissei Auto, is back from a marketing stint in the US with an authentic conviction that everything is a game. Once the man's daughter by a former mistress teams up with Sakuma so she can come into her inheritance in an expeditious manner—Juri is indeed her father's flesh and blood—the game is good to go!
And the name of this game is a kidnapping!
Born in 1958, Keigo Higashino studied electrical engineering and worked as a salaryman until he won the Edogawa Rampo Mystery Award in 1985. Originally a detective novelist, he has branched out to other genres, including science fiction.
“Higashino is a deft conjurer of human relationships, and while this is first and foremost a tale of grief— thankfully, no one calls Naoko a story of redemption—he infuses it with spasms of sharp humor.” —East Bay Express
“The novel flips suddenly…in wonderfully pleasing fashion, from pathetic tragedy to social satire and domestic comedy with themes of love, work, sex and education. How could we have ever imagined, without the help of a novel like this, that Japanese life could be so fraught with suffering and so entertaining all at once?” —Alan Cheuse for the Dallas Morning News
“A popular Japanese author of crime novels, Higashino doesn’t disappoint with this plot-driven, sleek novel of low-down crime in the world of high business.” —World Literature Today
Battle-tested project leader at a PR firm and slippery bachelor, Sakuma sees himself as a player. His smug self-regard doesn't seem entirely unfounded, both in love and at work. When is idea for a mini-theme park is dismissed as too costly and vacuous at the last minute by a major client he seems to have met his match.
Katsuragi, an heir and executive at the global car maker, Nissei Auto, is back from a marketing stint in the US with an authentic conviction that everything is a game. Once the man's daughter by a former mistress teams up with Sakuma so she can come into her inheritance in an expeditious manner—Juri is indeed her father's flesh and blood—the game is good to go!
And the name of this game is a kidnapping!
Creators
Born in 1958, Keigo Higashino studied electrical engineering and worked as a salaryman until he won the Edogawa Rampo Mystery Award in 1985. Originally a detective novelist, he has branched out to other genres, including science fiction.
“Higashino is a deft conjurer of human relationships, and while this is first and foremost a tale of grief— thankfully, no one calls Naoko a story of redemption—he infuses it with spasms of sharp humor.” —East Bay Express
“The novel flips suddenly…in wonderfully pleasing fashion, from pathetic tragedy to social satire and domestic comedy with themes of love, work, sex and education. How could we have ever imagined, without the help of a novel like this, that Japanese life could be so fraught with suffering and so entertaining all at once?” —Alan Cheuse for the Dallas Morning News
“A popular Japanese author of crime novels, Higashino doesn’t disappoint with this plot-driven, sleek novel of low-down crime in the world of high business.” —World Literature Today
