Japanese Crime Fiction: Deep-Dive Into “Prefecture D”an Essay by Tara Cheesman
Tara Cheesman takes a closer look at “Prefecture D”, a collection of crime novellas by Japanese author Hideo Yokoyama.
In twenty sixteen Six Four, described by critics as a slow burn Japanese police thriller, introduced English readers to the writer Hideo Yokoyama. Unlike most crime novels which focus on detectives, criminal investigations and violent crimes, his protagonist is Superintendent Yoshinobu Mikami, the Press Director in charge of Media Relations at Police Headquarters.
Asked to arrange a photo op between the Commissioner General and the family of a young girl who was kidnapped and murdered, Mikami finds himself drawn against his will into the unsolved, fourteen-year-old case. At the same time, he
