Good morning world! As I sit typing at my desk with my morning mug of Darjeeling and my favorite strawberry Oreos, the chirping of birds and the beatific light of the early-morning sun make a soothing backdrop to the wondrous clamour of thoughts in my mind. As I watch a pair of kaajer bou-s (domestic helps) walk along the road beneath my balcony in bright saris and wide grins on their faces with the excitement of perhaps some salacious piece of gossip enlivening the dull rut of the daily grind about to follow, I cannot help but think of how much things change, yet how much they still remain the same... I was never a morning person, always got up grumbling and unwilling from the cosy "banklet" (as my son calls it!) enveloping me and my dreams; but here I am- up early and bright of my own volition, jabbing away at the keyboard without a hint of sleep clouding my thoughts or vision, and a tremendous desire to transcribe the intangible flow into concrete words before the hubbub of daily life takes over.
The one thing that hasn't changed for me is my utter indifference to racy thrillers (not pure detective fiction mind you). I read them very rarely, and forget them promptly after having devoured them end-to-end with no lasting impression or remembrance of either the characters or the plot, sometimes even the name of the book! For an avid book-lover and bookworm, this is quite an aberration, but what to do- I'm like this only! :p
The only exception to this has been Stieg Larsson's Millennium Trilogy which I am a HUGE fan of! So I'd been quite eager to read the "Japanese Stieg Larsson" after reading rave reviews everywhere, and grabbed it gratefully when a friend offered to lend it to me. Eagerly lapped it up in 1-1/2 days, and am sorry to report that I am quite, well, overcome AND underwhelmed. This review then is going to be a concise summary of why I did not really like the book, so if you are a fan feel free to stay away or make me see reason in the comments :-) I'll try and put forth my impressions without giving away the plot, so no worries there for those who still haven't read it.
The Devotion of Suspect X is the highly acclaimed award-winning third novel of the Detective Galileo series written by Keigo Higashino, and is apparently being adapted into Kahani 2 (!) by the redoubtable Ekta Kapoor's Balaji Telefilms. It is a unique thriller (correct me if I am wrong, I haven't read too many thrillers to know the contrary) in the sense that you get to witness the murderer committing the crime at the very outset, so instead of a whodunnit, the novel plays out more as a how-to-catch-the-who - a cat-and-mouse game between the law enforcers and the apparent perpetrators of the crime. At the center of the story is the heroine Yasuko- the long-suffering ex-wife of the murdered man Togashi, her teenaged daughter Misato, Ishigami- her silent admirer and next-door neighbour, the police detective Kusanagi and the University physicist Yukawa. The crux of the plot lies in the battle of wits between Yukawa and Ishigami - former Science faculty batchmates at the Imperial University and long-lost-suddenly-reunited friends. While Manabu Yukawa is the affable but sharp as nails Detective Galileo, unofficially helping Kusanagi crack difficult cases with his astute, sometimes quite Sherlockian deductions, Tetsuya Ishigami is "The Buddha" - calm, inscrutable and a genius mathematician willing to go to extreme lengths to protect those whom he loves. The climax, when it unfolds, does leave you gasping with shock and horror, but it is the denouement that affected me the most - and in not a very nice way. It is in fact quite a mistake to call this book a thriller, I think. In its scope, themes and in the very way that it ends, The Devotion of Suspect X screamed out Tragedy, Tragedy, Tragedy to me... There is no redemption, no saving of lost and afflicted souls and when Aeschylan justice is finally meted out, you start wondering whether there is actually any justice in the world. I was quite depressed.
In case you are wondering about all the fruit in the picture, I was rendered quite queasy by some morbid descriptions of the committed crime reiterated quite a few times in the book, and these helped me suppress the nausea. The novel is otherwise quite atmospheric in a realistic-yet-surreal way, evoking vivid images of Japanese suburban life which is quite a welcome break from all the American hash we usually have to endure.Overall, worth a one-time read, though it's not quite to my taste.