I had so much fun reading this book! It had so many things I love in classic mysteries like family secrets in isolated, small villages and there's a potentially unreliable narrator.

The prologue tells us the history of the village and how it got its name and then we are introduced to Tatsuya, our narrator, who having been raised with no knowledge of his extended family has been informed that he has connection to a wealthy family in a remote village. So begins the drama.

I love that we get a feel for this period of Japanese history (post WWII) and how Seishi Yokomizo pulls in small town superstition with the myths/lores of the region to create a really unique atmosphere. I also really liked the fact that the book was from Tatsuya's perspective rather than Detective Kindaichi's, though that maybe because as this is only the second of the books I've read in the series I haven't grown attached enough to Kindaichi to feel his absence like I do in some of the Poirot novels where Christie does the same thing.

I would highly recommend this to fans of Golden Age mystery novels or anyone who is looking for a mystery/thriller novel that actually is more mystery than thriller.

What I liked: A very innovative murder mystery with a unique premise. The village characters we are introduced to are intriguing to follow. The murder plot was unpredictable and quite shocking. There are some supernatural elements which I enjoyed too. This book has it all; outrageous villagers, creepy grandmas, a cursed village, a hidden treasure, a weird love triangle, and an amazing mystery.

What I didn't like: The famous detective is in only 3-4 scenes and doesn't seem to have much impact on the story. The fact that almost every woman was throwing herself onto the main character was too much for me. And was everyone screwing their cousin back in the day!?

The Village of Eight Graves by Seishi Yokomizo

The third murder mystery novel by Seishi Yokomizo this time features detective Kosuke Kindaichi as a minor character and instead we get the view point of someone wrapped in the mystery. I loved the change in prospective in this one and to see the mystery from someone inside of it. It kept me guessing until the end and turning the page.

⭐⭐⭐

Synopsis 📖

Nestled deep in the mountains of Japan, the hamlet of Eight Graves takes its name from a centuries-old massacre. Ever since that bloody day, people say, a terrible curse has hung over the village.

When young Tatsuya arrives from the city to claim a mysterious inheritance, death follows close behind. After a series of gruesome poisonings, the villagers’ suspicion quickly falls on the newcomer. With the help of the famous Kosuke Kindaichi, Tatsuya must race to uncover the murderer and save his own life before the inhabitants of Eight Graves take justice into their own hands.

Thanks to Netgalley for the advanced readers copy in exchange for an honest review.

Another fantastic offering from the reprinted Pushkin Vertigo series with a phenomenal work of translation. Once again the unkempt and imperturbable Detective Kosuke Kindaichi is investigating a locked room mystery with his usual air of nonchalance (imagine Columbo crossed with Sherlock). This time the story is set in a small Japanese village where the occupants have been cursed for generations and unfortunately a heinous historical crime appears to be repeating itself. I love this series of mysteries and look forward to further editions being reissued. I also have to give kudos to the funky cover artwork and jacket material. Fab stuff.

A fine piece of detective fiction, although the detective in question plays a relatively minor role -- the narration is from the POV of someone who is believed erroneously by some to be the culprit, who does a decent amount of investigation into the ever-increasing body count (in order to clear his own name). Some mysteries from decades ago come across as a little stilted now, but this book doesn't suffer from its age, and rather benefits from its sense of place and time -- part of the underlying tension in the eponymous village comes from the societal upheaval in postwar Japan, including city-dwellers returning to their home village after the cities they lived in having been so wrecked that they can't or don't want to live there anymore.

Pushkin Press and the translator deserve praise for making another classic Japanese mystery available to a wider reading public. However I regret I did not find this latest release to my taste.

Having almost given up completely during my reading of the horrifying Prologue, I did persist but found this entry in the Kindaichi series rather tedious.

Perhaps it was because the endearing detective appears little or because the plot was uninteresting ly complex but I enjoyed this much less than The Honjin Murders and The Inugami Curse.

Thank you to NetGalley and Pushkin Vertigo for the digital review copy.

There is always something about translations that intrigue me.

Japanese books have been rising in popularity across the Western market for years—see: Before The Coffee Gets Cold, There’s No Such Thing as an Easy Job, Convenience Store Woman—and as I read them, I’m always thinking about what the book must have read like in the original language.

What were the particular cadences in this book? What was the original author’s voice like? What references have been changed to better appeal to a Western audience?

I think the English translations of Seishi Yokomizo’s detective novels are some of the better translations I have gotten to read, especially with the release of The Village of Eight Graves.

In the third novel of the series, an orphan finds that he is the heir to the Tajimi inheritance, but when he travels to meet his long-lost family in their hometown, relatives suddenly begin dropping like flies.

The Village of Eight Graves has taken their name from a centuries ago curse, when the then-villagers had betrayed a group of samurais for their fortune, only to be cursed for eight generations with the samuarais’ dying breaths. Eight people will die per generation in exchange for the eight lives they took.

The curse strongly manifests in the Tajimi family, with one member of the family going on a killing rampage every generation. And now with Tatsuya’s return, the curse seems to be starting up again.

And with everyone turning against Tatsuya, only detective Kosuke Kindaichi can prove his innocence.

I adore the premise of The Village of Eight Graves; the generations-long curse is a trope well beloved in any Asian culture. And coupled with the tropes of forbidden love, filial piety and fate, the novel reads like an introduction to Asian drama, in the best way possible.

Like I’ve mentioned in my previous newsletters, even though I love just about any mystery novel, I tend to have trouble following the twists and turns and often rely on that final reveal to explain who the villain is. The Honjin Murder, the first in this series, was one of the rare books where I had no trouble following along due to how clearly every thought was explained.

I did also did find it somewhat funny that the villagers were so incensed at Tatsuya’s return, despite the fact that they were the ones who had originally betrayed the samurai and Tatsuya—who had barely ever existed within the village—was somehow personally responsible for the deaths of some strangers.

My only qualm about this book is that I found the romance subplot a little misplaced. I did see it coming, but maybe after reading too many romance books this year, I’ve been spoiled for what kind of pacing we should come to expect when two characters fall in love. I would argue that this flaw is one that is fairly easy to ignore; if I really wanted to, I could just skip a few paragraphs and it wouldn’t take anything away from the story.

If you’re looking for a nice murder mystery to wind up the year, The Village of Eight Graves by Seishi Yokomizo is a wonderful choice with enough twists and turns to keep any budding detective interested.

A place is called the village of eight graves. A place doesn’t get such a name without a bloody history that over the years gets transformed into legend — complete with its samurais and labyrinths, superstitions and curses, and even rumours of buried treasure!

Cut to post-war Japan and one young man is contacted by a lawyer, informing him that he is an heir to an affluent and influential family in the village of Eight Graves. But when he goes to this village, bodies start dropping like flies.

For someone who was quite bored while reading The Honjin Murders, I was completely hooked to the mystery and thrill of The Village of Eight Graves, despite some of its caricature-like characters.

However, for a book marketed as a detective Kosuke Kindaichi mystery, there wasn’t much presence of the detective himself in the book. A minor gripe in an otherwise enjoyable mystery/thriller.

Having read The Honjin Murders, I was looking forward to read The Village of Eight Graves. My thanks to Pushkin Press and NetGalley for a review copy of this book.

This is what passes for a cozy mystery and a quick read. The joy here is not just discovering the culprit but also the how and the why of it. The story takes a while to take off but once it does, the pace really picks up. All in all, a great read.

The kindle version needs an update though. Every few sentences, I had 2 letters missing from a word. This was more of an annoyance than anything but did take away from the joy of reading the book. Hopefully, it is corrected in the final proof.

•~Book Review~•

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If you have heard the name 'Seishi Yokomizo', I have no doubt that you are well acquainted about the famous Kosuke Kindaichi detective mystery book ' The Honjin Murders '.
So here comes another one of the most famous Kosuke Kindaichi detective mystery novel ' The Village of Eight Graves '.
Far away from Japan, there's a small village hidden in deep mist with a bloody history, the killings of eight samurais from the Amago dynasty. Killed by the villagers out of greed for their golds. The death wrecks havoc so much so that the villagers finally repent and build them a shrine and hence comes the name of the village.
Many centuries pass by and one day, a young man Tatsuya arrives there and so does starts, the mysterious killings of eight people.
The history repeats.
And this time, the brilliant Kosuke Kindaichi investigates and solves the mystery.
How you ask? You have to read the book.
🍃
This is the first time that I have read a detective novel that unfurls in the perspective of one of the main characters but not the detective's.
The history was engaging, there were times where I felt my attention dwindling but the plot picks up from the middle and I was thoroughly engaged and couldn't put the book down.
I enjoyed the book very much.

The Village of Eight Graves is a fun, classic mystery novel. It has a frame narrative, i.e. "I found this manuscript but didn't write it," and a quirky detective. The narrator is not the detective, which was fun. The narrator, instead, is Tatsuya, the main suspect (to everyone except the detective Kosuke Kindaichi), so readers know he is not committing the murders, but are left in the dark as to who is. The history of the town, with all its supernatural elements, makes this closed room mystery extra suspenseful. Add hidden under ground tunnels, a mummified corpse, and villagers with torches, and the novel is right on the verge of being a paranormal thriller. I really enjoyed this book, and will go back and read the others in the series. I wish I had access to many more of them, so I hope the publisher keeps translating them!

I absolutely adored The Decagon House Murders, and have been avidly keeping an eye out for other English-translated titles by this author. Great!

I love this series!

It is a slightly familiar format, and one the author Seishi Yolomizo explores well - deep, dark family secrets, which when brought into open, give birth to jealousy, greed and ultimately ... murder. And here we have all those elements: a family saga of love and hate, revenge and redemption; many suspects but always one whom you are least likely to suspect; a suspenseful mystery, tied together by a long narrative that conveys the essence of the story, location and characters to perfection.

I love the character of Kosuke Kindaichi - a Japanese Columbo if you are wanting a comparison. Kindaichi is portrayed as being slightly eccentric, wearing a robe and trousers that have seen better days, as well as having bad dandruff. He also gets easily stressed and excitable, which brings on his stuttering. And yet beneath all of the yokel-like exterior, is an exceedingly clever detective. It goes to show that you should never judge a book by its cover (though Yokomizo's are fabulous!).

I cannot but suggest the reader delve into these mysteries for themselves.

This is an engaging whodunnit that had me second guessing all my theories the whole time I was reading it. There's murder, family history and village myths, murder, love and hate, murder, creeping around in the middle of the night and in caves, murder, maybe some treasure, murder, and a satisfactory end.

There are a lot of characters so it is best read in a short time period. This is a Japanese classic translated to English and I would definitely like to read another from this series.

I read the two previous translations of Seishi Yokomizo and enjoyed them very much, this one was a little more entangled but very rewarding read. It is a little hard to get used to the characters and the style in which these stories are developed but again a great journey with a surprising ending.

I’m afraid I didn’t get on with The Village of Eight Graves. I suspect if you’re in the right mood it’s a lot of fun, but it didn’t click with me. It certainly has all the right elements, a string of murders, a bloody backstory and a load of twists. Unfortunately I found it confusing and by the end was rushing through it so I could get to the next thing.

My thanks to Pushkin Press and NetGalley for a review copy of this book.

While I have read and enjoyed a fair few Japanese titles, despite all good intentions, I hadn’t gotten down to picking up any mystery title yet; this book gave me the chance to remedy that, and I enjoyed it very much indeed. The Village of Eight Graves is the third of the 77 detective novels featuring detective Kosuke Kindaichi published between 1946 and 1980 to be translated into English under the Pushkin Vertigo imprint.

The Village of Eight Graves opens with the rather cruel and horrifying legend that gives the fictional village that is our setting its unusual name; the betrayal and murder of eight samurai hiding out in the village by the villagers, for the treasure they were rumoured to be carrying, resulting in the entire village being cursed. We fast forward in time to some twenty-six or twenty-seven years before the current events when the village is subjected to another set of shocking events, a murderous spree that claimed many lives, and was attributed to that very curse.

In the present, our narrator is twenty-eight-year-old Tatsuya, brought up by his mother and later step-father who one day discovers his true antecedents (it was his father who was responsible for all those deaths twenty-seven years ago). His ‘real’ family, or rather the family of his father has been seeking him as he is the heir to the family estate with his only (half) brother being on the verge of death. Alongside, his maternal grandfather has also come to town (Kobe) in search of him. But before Tatsuya can even set out for Eight Graves, his grandfather falls down dead, poisoned. Tatsuya also receives an anonymous threatening letter warning him off returning to Eight Graves. All the same, he is escorted by Miyako Mori, a young widow who’s been living in her ancestral home in the village, and who provides him much needed support on the journey and on his first entry into the village where he finds most villagers hostile to his arrival, believing that this will only unleash another bout of terror. And indeed, it does, for his grandfather’s death is only the first of a series of senseless murders that begin to take place in the village. And in each instance Tatsuya is the prime suspect. While the police and with them Detective Kosuke Kindaichi are investigating the case, and seem to at least partly believe Tatsuya, we essentially follow Tatsuya’s narrative all through as he tries to cope with his new surroundings, get to know his new-found family, and also come to terms with the terrifying events unfolding around him.

This enjoyable mystery/adventure unfolds somewhat differently from the conventional whodunit, for our narrator Tatsuya while looking into matters is not really following the Detective Kosuke Kindaichi, except for the times they interact; and so the police and Kindaichi’s investigations we learn of are only as Tatsuya learns them, and take place for the most part, off the page. The events as we follow them are Tatsuya’s narrative of his experiences which includes not only the mysterious and seemingly senseless murders that are taking place and which place Tatsuya at the centre of accusations but also his navigating his new-found family and the village, learning his mother’s story, and his exploration of family secrets and relationships.

While Tatsuya and the police are convinced the events taking place are entirely in the human realm, events unfold in a rather creepy and unsettling atmosphere for we have the background of the village curse, the murderous rampage that Tatsuya’s father went on, the superstitions and rumours doing the rounds, and also some ill omens like lightning splitting an ancient tree. This made for a pretty eerie background for out story to play out in even though we too, know that the answer is nothing to do with any curse.

Another aspect of the background which I liked was the feel we get of Japan in this period, just after the Second World War—the position people find themselves in, the changing face of things, and also people’s struggle to make ends meet. There is also a glimpse of myth and tradition in rituals, mentions of Tengus, etc. And then there is also the remote village we find ourselves in where superstition looms large, people seem easily manipulated, and the police despite their powers can do little to reign in a mob once provoked which makes the situation for Tatsuya rather grave, fear we can feel with him.

As far as the whodunit itself was concerned, I wasn’t able to guess which of the possible suspects might have done it for there were quite a few with reason enough. With Tatsuya as our narrator, rather than us following the detective’s perspective, I was also not sure how far we were to accept his version and whether we were to look for hidden meanings or inconsistencies. But the solution was satisfactory and there were some hints to it earlier in the book as well.

There is also an adventure thread related to the legend of the Samurais’ treasure and past events which takes Tatsuya and others exploring some underground caves and tunnels which had me thinking of old Enid Blyton favourites, and which was great fun. Tatsuya’s mother’s story and his relationship with his half-sister Haruko bring in some emotional moments and alongside, there is also a thread of romance.

This was all in all a very satisfying and enjoyable read, with a nice and creepy atmosphere, interesting mystery and characters, and quite a few parallel threads to keep one reading all through.

4.25 stars

Thank you Netgallt for my copy of this read.
This was a really interesting read. I haven't read any detective/ mystery murder books in a while. Tatsuya recieves a weird message at work about his long lost family and immediately goes to them. Once he arrives, things start becoming weird. Murder after murder and everyone is a suspect. Things aren't what they seem Nd Tatsuya must find the truth.
I found with this read there were lots and highs, some parts I found repetitive espeically when they spent so much time in the caves. However, it was a good mystery and I was intruged throughout the whole book.

This was my second mystery novel by Seishi Yokomizo. The other one I read was "The Inugami Curse" where I had quite a few problems with the word choice of the detective and also with the foreshadowing. But the descriptions in this novel where in the most cases not nearly as offensive as in the other book, which could go in hand with the change of perspective as this book is not told from the detectives point of view. I think this makes it pretty interesting. We still find foreshadowing in this book as well but not nearly as much and predicting as in "The Inugame Curse". I guessed quite a few things in between but forgot them again until they were actually revealed, but that's what happens to me with most mysteries and it was still really enjoyable. But I must say the actual reveal at the end felt kinda off for me. Though the epilogue was funny to read.

Also because of personal matters it took me 10 days to read this book and if I had read it faster and all the details would have stayed with me I might have guessed more of the whole picture, so I would recommend reading it with a bit of time on your hand in one weekend.

Here already my rating: A solid 4/5 for me.

The next part might spoil you because I speak about tropes and the things I guessed so please refrain from reading if you want to read the book and want to guess along:
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I love that again I get some femme fatale but the actual motive was a bit sad to be honest. Also I guessed that it was an ABC murder case but I can't pinpoint anymore if that wasn't because of some foreshadowing. Still it was clear to me pretty early on. I also had guessed the situation with eisen far before the reveal. But I forgot it again anyway so the reveal was still enjoyable. Just after that it started to feel a bit off. Also it was clear to me that they would let Miyako die at the end.
I want to mention one question was in my mind for most of the time in the second half of the book. How where the places of the cave known to the villagers but at the same time nobody knew of the caves. I think there I had some problem with the connection of all the different information.
On the one hand nobody knew these tunnels existed for they would have found the body of old man Tajimi there if they had known, but on the other hand half of the village used the caves and there were even superstitions about the different places. That had me a bit lost.

Thank you to Pushkin Vertigo and NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

The Village of Eight Graves is the 3rd title in the Detective Kosuke Kindaichi mystery series to be translated into English. The story revolves around Tatsuya, who arrives in the titular village against the premonitions and a centuries-long curse. In the past, eight samurais were murdered in the village in the mountains, and their secret treasure was never found. Tatsuya arrives just as a series of deadly poisonings begin. Fortunately, Detective Kindaichi is there to sort out the case and find the culprit. Will the Detective find the murderer before it's too late?

Here is a bloody excerpt from an opening chapter, which is told from Tatsuya's perspective:

"When I took the letter, I had a horrible premonition. The envelope was made of blotting paper, course and of very poor quality - hardly the sort of stationery used by a lawyer with an office on the fourth floor of the Nitto Building...
You must never set foot in the village of Eight Graves again. Nothing good will come of it. The gods here are angry. If ever you come back, there will be blood! Blood! The carnage that took place twenty-six years ago will repeat itself, and the village will once again become a sea of blood."

Overall, The Village of Eight Graves is a solid mystery that will appeal to fans of earlier books in the Detective Kosuke Kindaichi series. I thought really hard about what rating to give this book. I have loved previous books from Pushkin Vertigo, such The Decagon House Murders, and I was really looking forward to reading this book. Unfortunately, this story set in the 40's just didn't hold up for me as a contemporary reader. There were moments when I felt creeped out and felt a sense of Victorian suspense, similar to what I felt watching an old Sherlock Holmes TV show. However, there were also moments that failed to hold my interest. If you're intrigued by the excerpt above, or if you're a fan of Sherlock Holmes-type mysteries, I recommend that you check out this book when it comes out in December!