California Dreamin'

During what was, perhaps, the only Dungeons & Dragons session I have ever participated in, a friend of mine made a pitch for me to jump on the science-and-fantasy fiction bandwagon. Said friend introduced me to the 'Dying Earth' subgenre, which also happens to be a common theme and setting in Dungeons & Dragons games. It has a long lineage, featuring works from Mary Shelley and H. G. Wells to those by Gene Wolfe, but my friend particularly recommended stories and novels by Jack Vance. As it turns out, the subgenre is named as a tribute to Vance and his Dying Earth series (1950–1984).

I never did explore the 'Dying Earth' subgenre or Vance's series. My loyalty and devotion to crime fiction proved to be far stronger—and a cursory dive into Vance's bibliography showed that he wrote and published a number of crime and mystery fiction works, including a few under the Ellery Queen pseudonym. Last year, on a whim, I decided to read what sounded like one of the more interesting titles in his oeuvre—The Fox Valley Murders (1966). It is safe to say that I hit the jackpot in my first encounter with Vance's works.

Lived experiences of authors loom large over books I have read (or reread) in recent years. The descriptions of numerous fictional locations (villages, towns, hotels, buildings, among others) in Agatha Christie's novels, such as Peril at End House, Evil Under the Sun, and The Body in the Library, for instance, are said to draw inspiration from her travels and stays particularly in Devon and Torquay. In Seishi Yokomizo's Kosuke Kindaichi series, on the other hand, Yokomizo's wartime experiences in the Japan's Okayama islands mould the settings, the narratives, the politics as well as the way characters act and interact with each other—particularly in works such as The Honjin Murders, Death on Gokumon Island and The Village of Eight Graves.

In The Fox Valley Murders, Vance draws upon his childhood experiences in his beloved Californian countryside in a more personal and intimate manner than Christie or Yokomizo. The result is a work where the geography and the cast of characters emerge as something resembling picture cut-outs from a photo album. It is, therefore, not surprising to note that the novel is propelled by an effective combination of nostalgia, and the use of well-defined, believable characters, crisp, entertaining, and humorous conversations, as well as vivid, evocative descriptions of locales. Employing a very American diction, The Fox Valley Murders is, in my opinion, one of the finest specimens of a 'regional mystery' I have ever encountered.

Events of the past cast long shadows—and these shadows re-emerge when Ausley Wyett ("tall and awkward, with lank brown hair, knobby knees and wrists, a good-natured, if somewhat moony, face") steps into the town of Marblestone in California's San Rodrigo county after serving a 16-year-long jail term. If there's one thing that unites Marbletown's residents otherwise divided by petty jealousies and rivalries, it's a profound hatred for Ausley ("A lot of people around here don't feel too Christian about Ausley Wyett"), who was convicted of raping and killing 13-and-half-year old Tissie McAllister (who "loved her parents and was loved in return"). Ausley maintained his innocence at the inquest, but even though the evidence leading up to the crime—a number of people having witnessed Ausley and Tissie walking together but not the crime itself—is pretty much circumstantial, Ausley's own actions after the murder ("I lost my head and did the foolishest thing I could have done”) drove a nail in his coffin. Some miles away from the town, he had been spotted, "digging a hole, with close at hand the body of Tissie McAllister." However, even a prison term fails to cure his hardheadedness, because after returning to Marblestone, the first thing he does is to send a letter to the five persons who had testified against him:

"Dear Sir:

I am now out of jail, where I have served sixteen long years. I could write a long book on the dreadful experiences I have witnessed. How do you plan to make this up to me? I await your response with great interest.

Very truly yours,
Ausley L. Wyett"

It is this letter that sets in motion the events of The Fox Valley Murders.

At around the same time that Ausley sets the cat among pigeons on his return to Marbletown, Joe Bain becomes the acting-sheriff of San Rodrigo county, after his predecessor Ernest Cucchinello ("Cooch") dies of pneumonia. 16 years ago, Joe had been "the tall hell-raising lad from Castle Mountain, who had run away from home and now lived in San Rodrigo where he consorted with Mexicans and fruit tramps." However, life soon served several curveballs. His wife elopes with a band's guitarist, leaving him with "his nineteen-month-old daughter Miranda standing in the play-pen, diapers dripping, milk-bottle empty, quietly philosophic about the whole sad situation." Leaving his child in the care of his mother, Joe  then joined the military, saw action in Korea, transferred to the military police, and used his GI benefits to study criminology. He then became a deputy-sheriff under Cucchinello, but the sheriff's death adds more responsibilities on Joe's shoulders. On a day-to-day basis, he also has to deal with the sly opposition of Mrs. Rostvolt, "clerk, matron, office manager and power behind the throne", who continuously undermines Joe's authority, and acts as the eyes and ears of the next likeliest sheriff candidate—Lee Gervase, "a vigorous and progressive young lawyer, formerly of San Francisco." Joe ultimately throws his name into the sheriff candidacy hat, partly on a whim, and partly to keep the old-school nature and identity of San Rodrigo county alive.

Despite his daily frustrations, Joe never lets go of his keen, wry sense of observation, and makes himself available to most of the needs and demands of the residents:

"Charley Blankenship never seemed to change. He was a tall, pale, horse-faced old man with long arms and legs, soft gray hair, watery blue eyes, a pendulous pink mouth. He lived the life of a gentleman farmer, with a forty-acre cherry orchard and a white two-story house on Destin Road, south of Marblestone. Joe Bain had known him for as long as he could remember. During May, a favorite recreation among the local young people was stealing Blankenship cherries. Joe retained a vivid recollection of Charley Blankenship’s pallid face peering down the rows. He often carried a shotgun loaded with rock salt, and on one occasion had shot his nephew Walt Hobius. Opinion was divided on whether Charley had recognized Walt. Walt thought that he had, though Charley denied it to Walt’s mother, Dora. For the last ten years Charley leased the forty acres to a Japanese family, who during cherry season maintained a patrol even more vigilant than Charley’s had been."

Joe's common sense and troubleshooting skills are soon put to the test, as he has to balance his duties as  an acting-sheriff, as well as that of a candidate looking to win the upcoming sheriff election:

"Charley Blankenship turned him a look of more yellow malevolence than Joe would have thought possible from so rheumy and dew-lapped a face. There goes a vote, he thought in alarm. He jumped to his feet. “I’ll sure look into it, Mr. Blankenship. I believe in striking the iron before it gets hot. That way nobody gets burned."

Things do not get easier when a series of murders soon rocks Marblestone, claiming the lives of nearly all who had testified against Ausley. Former bus driver Bus Hacker dies in front of Joe, just as he opens the door to his house. Later, his house is burned down. Mushroom lover Charley Blankenship dies after eating a dish mixed with commonly known poisonous mushrooms which he picked himself. Willis Neff, another testifier, is shot dead, presumably in a hunting accident, in an open glade in a neighbouring county (warning: there is a glaring error in the timeline of death in this case, possibly due to a printing mistake). Oliver Viera falls off his ladder and plunges into a ravine while trying taking down a can of paint from the edge of the roof of his house. Towards the end, Cole Destin also has a very close shave in a traffic accident, but he survives. As Joe admirably puts it: "You feel a fool saying ‘accident’, you feel a fool claiming foul play. So what do you do?”

Investigator Joe comes across as a hardworking gumshoe, but much of his instincts are steered by his astute understanding of the residents of Marbletown and the relationship he shares with them. This same astuteness serves him well when he campaigns for votes, and it is amusing to see him switch between sleuthing and campaigning every so often:

Two elderly women came up to him. One asked in a bantering tone, “Can you be Joe Bain, the young rapscallion who was the shame of the neighborhood?”

Joe grinned. “I guess that’s me. And you’re Mrs. Mathews, my old third-grade teacher.”

“So you remember me after all these years!”

“How could I forget?”

The other lady said archly, “I don’t imagine you remember me!”

“I certainly do,” said Joe. “You’re Mrs. Beasley, at the post office. When I was ten years old I kissed your daughter. You caught me and whacked me good.”

“Think of it,” Mrs. Beasley marveled to Mrs. Mathews. “Ten years old he was, and kissing Arla bold as you please. Ten years old! And Arla pretending it was just an everyday occurrence. Oh, the little rascals. I hate to think what went on when my back was turned.”

“It goes to show that you never can tell. Arla’s married with four children, and Joe’s sheriff of the county.” Mrs. Mathews beamed roguishly at Joe. “How we used to pity your poor mother, coping with a pair like your father and you!”

“I imagine she felt sorry for herself at times,” said Joe.

The same Mrs. Beasley turns out to be a voter for Joe—and more importantly, provides a hint to the one existing, material evidence that would turn the case on its head, and indict the real criminal.

Reading the several conversations Joe has in sticky situations—and the way he inevitably exploits them (and the relationships he shares with antagonistic characters) for his benefit—makes one appreciate what a master manipulator he is. For instance, Joe is almost ensnared in a cartoonishly false rape allegation by Mary Destin, wife of Cole Destin and Tissie's elder sister—something that could have had serious implications on Joe's bid to be a sheriff. However, instead of being drawn into a long-drawn battle, Joe confronts the case head-on, lays out all his cards in front of Mary, and 'convinces' Mary that the implications of this case could be even more harmful for her—all in the presence of a hostile but influential local newspaper editor who agrees to drop the sensational article that would have demonized Joe even further. 

The conversations, interactions, and rich character portraits further reveal what a closed world Marblestone really is—where, barring a few exceptions, grudges are hard to forget, and meanness comes naturally to most, and whose prettiest pictures possibly exist only in the photos of an album. No wonder then that the real culprit's motives stem from an intense psychological pettiness and hostility towards their fellow residents. It is as though the town's atmosphere invisibly influences the culprit to carry out their deeds. 

Navigating such a familiar but unfriendly terrain, Joe pulls off an impressive double act—solving a devilish case and winning the sheriff election. To achieve this, Joe is constantly on the move, across the length and breadth of Marblestone and even beyond. These travels allow readers to immerse in some picturesque descriptions of Marblestone, its environs and neighbouring counties, as well as partake in some offbeat sights and sounds in and around the town: a church fight, a farmers' market, a political rally, a clash between a religious community and city folks, and more. 

The journeys also allow Joe to travel into his past and occupy himself with reflections:

This was Slough-house, an institution at its heyday during Prohibition, when it acquired a reputation for picturesque vice which it never quite outlived. Slough-house was now relatively respectable. True, there were rooms to be rented on a casual basis; complaisant ladies could generally be found at the bar. On summer Saturday nights there was dancing at an open-air pavilion beside the slough. Some of the most fragrant memories of Joe’s youth were connected with these Saturday night dances. The orchestra played romantic old tunes like I’ll See You in My Dreams, Whispering, Three O’Clock in the Morning; the weeping willows changed color as the floodlights shifted through red, blue, green, and gold. After one such dance occurred the incident which culminated in Joe’s marriage … Joe heaved a sigh for his lost youth. A dozen cars were parked in front of the bar. Luminous medallions advertising beer winked a cheerful invitation, but Joe drove past. It might not be too good an idea to be seen here. Not till after election, anyway.

In another instance, Joe thoughts take on a level-headed, morbid tinge:

Joe drove south along Destin Road to the ruins of the Hacker house. The fence smothered in red roses still stood. Joe leaned on the gate and considered the black rubble beyond.

The sun was gone; twilight blurred the mountain slopes, lights began to sparkle up and down the valley. Joe listened. Silence except for the warm wind in the poplars. A bat flew twittering past. The ashes of the Hacker house seemed more melancholy than ever. Joe thought of Millie’s letters to Bus, written long ago when the world was young. He looked down into the rubble where the exploded glass of Millie’s jams and preserves still reflected a few sullen lights from the sky. Life was a funny thing, thought Joe. You just reached the stage where you could appreciate it when you had to start worrying about how it would end … He walked back to his car, drove into Marblestone.

It all leads to a most unusual and entertaining climax where Joe eliminates his political rival, Lee Gervase, by implicating him in the case Joe is trying to solve for witholding vital information. In the same rally, much to the glee of the audience, the high-level delegates and organizers are left with eggs on their faces when Joe proceeds to reveal the truth behind the current spree of murders, as well as the killing of Tissie McAllister. All loose ends are tied up—and, for all its darkness, the novel has a happy ending.

Where the novel does subvert the classic detective fiction mould somewhat is in its choice of Joe as the protagonist, and a further definition of his role. In the grand old game of cat-and-mouse, as seen in Christie's Poirot and Yokomizo's Kindaichi series, the great detective often participates in a case in the capacity of a visitor, where they travel to places and glean information, background, and context from often untrustworthy and unwilling locals. The result is a view of the politics and mechanics of crime from the lens of an outsider. In The Fox Valley Murders, however, we are privy to the complexities of crimes, their impact on a town's residents and politicians, and the process of solving them, through the eyes of a local: Sheriff Bain. This makes for a more realistic portrayal, in so far as Joe's mastery of a crooked game is concerned—Joe has to manipulate his way through a corrupt rival, a sly subordinate, hostile and prejudiced inhabitants of the town, as well as media-persons and political dignitaries dead set against him as a candidate for the sheriff's position.

Seen in this light, The Fox Valley Murders has more in common with Murder, She Wrote (1984–1996), that wonderful series set in (mostly) smalltown America. The series introduces writer Jessica Fletcher, hailing from Cabot Cove, Maine, in the role of a sleuth. In my opinion, Jessica straddles the insider-outsider dichotomy perfectly. In the cases set in, say, Boston or New York, she fulfils the role of an inquisitive guest or trespasser, rising above circumstantial difficulties and solving the cases while being mocked and frowned upon by the suspects in the case. However, when incidents happen in Cabot Cove, things get a bit too personal, and Jessica performs a role akin to what Joe does in The Fox Valley Murders. While the modus operandi may not be as gritty and manipulative as seen in Vance's work, Jessica does call upon favours from his companions (Dr. Seth Hazlitt and Sheriff Amos Tupper), and relies on her knowledge of Cabot Cove's residents, the relationship she shares with them, the city's history and evolving political climate, to dispense her own brand of ratiocinative, but ultimately sympathetic, justice—just as Joe Bain does.

Vance would go on to write another full-fledged Joe Bain novel, The Pleasant Grove Murders (1967), and a fully-sketched outline of a third novel, The Genesee Slough Murders. As someone previously relatively unaware of, but now keen to explore, American countryside mysteries of the kind seen in The Fox Valley Murders, I can only imagine the kind of complexities and tricks Vance cooked up in his latter two efforts.

Thank You for the Music

Last year, I started with what I have since termed the 'Detective Conan Rewatch and Reread' project—the goal being to consume the entire franchise (manga, anime series and movies) from the very start in a chronological manner. It has been an instructive experience insofar as the evolution of the art-style and the plots are concerned. Although the series spans three decades with more than 1100 chapters and episodes, it still retains a reasonable degree of freshness and originality in both its main storyline and the fillers, which accounts for its rewatchable nature. 

Although a common criticism the series faces is that its central plot is stretching for far too long, creator Gosho Aoyama's top-notch world-building more than makes up for this. The Detective Conan universe is centred mainly around the fictional Beika City, and Conan and gang often travel all across the town and beyond, resulting in a dizzying variety of settings in which each of the stories/episodes are set: from mansions and restaurants to aquarians and museums to studios to camping and festival sites, and many more. And, in a majority of the cases, the locales play as important an role as the actions of the characters in the way the stories unfold.

There are, however, a few scenarios and themes that Aoyama loves to explore from time to time: music, sports and theatre being some of them. That is why stadiums, studios and theatres have formed the backdrop of a number of significant incidents that Conan has encountered. What I have also observed is a certain consistency in the way Aoyama explores these themes. For instance, stories involving musicians and band members have invariably involved tragic deaths borne out of terrible misunderstandings. 

This template was introduced pretty early in one of the more heart-wrenching stories (no, not this one), "The Karaoke Box Murder Case" (manga chapters: 45–48, anime episode: 42). Conan and his girlfriend, Ran, are invited by their friend, Sonoko, to the private meeting of a popular band, Lex, whose lead singer Kimura Tatsuya happens to be Sonoko's latest crush. What they witness, instead, is the animosity-filled break-up of the band, with the drunken Tatsuya announcing his decision to go solo. In the karaoke box, he humiliates each member of the band, past and present, including the manager, by choosing and requesting songs that would have hit a sore spot with each of them. Finally, he sings his heart out to the tune of his hit song, "Bloody Venus"... before dramatically coughing up blood and dying.

Foreshadowing Tatsuya's death

The mystery mostly unfolds as a howdunnit, but the 'why' and 'who' aspects of it are also quite engrossing. The howdunnit concerns mostly around how Tatsuya could be poisoned without the others getting affected. There are a few plausible and well-thought-out false solutions that keep pointing the needle of suspicion towards different members, and a suicide scenario as well. [Unfortunately, these are rushed through and/or ommited in the anime adaptation of the more nuanced manga arc.] The actual solution, however, makes excellent use of the habits and mannerisms of singers while performing—something the killer uses to precise and devastating effect. Ironically enough, the culprit is revealed when Conan (using the voice of Shinichi Kudou) asks the culprit to mimic the exact actions of the deceased, and then produces the two material evidences to decisively corner the criminal.

There is no doubt that an element of fortune is required to reveal the 'who' and 'why' of it all, but it doesn't make the tragedy any less poignant. At the centre of it is Aoyama's reflection on how musical fame and stardom can quietly devastate performers, make them lonely and unable to connect with their near and dear ones and communicate people. There are also two cautionary messages—one on taking one's need to be noticed and loved to extreme levels by making drastic changes to one's personality, the other on masking vulnerability, keeping up a facade, and displaying too much of tough love—both of which play major roles in the unfolding of the tragedy of the karaoke box.

Aoyama takes a shot at the extremes of manipulated musical fandom in "The Devil of the TV Station" (manga chapters: 591–593, anime episode: 488). Conan and his friends Mitsuhiko, Ayumi, and Genta, along with Professor Agasa, visit a TV station to see the studio of a popular kids' show, Kamen Yaiba. The plan, however, fails to materialize, as the actress, Yoko Okino, who had invited them for the tour, mentions that their schedules are tight and packed for the day. Instead, they come across Satan Onizuka, the lead singer of the visual kei band Styx III, in full KISS/Satan makeup, who is scheduled for a TV appearance in the afternoon. Back in his dressing room, Onizuka asks his manager to order food from three outlets as well as a hand mirror to fix his makeup (since the mirrors in his room are broken). He also expressly instructs the manager not to let anyone disturb or enter the room since he would be removing his makeup and take a nap in his room before the interview. The next time, we encounter Onizuka is when Mitsuhiko knocks on the door of his room, requesting an autograph for his sister. Onizuka appears, once again, in full makeup—an appearance that also coincides with the arrival of the police as Tenji Urushibara, the president of the entertainment company representing Onizuka and his band, is found dead in the station with several stab wounds. Suspicion naturally falls on Onizuka who recently had a heated argument with Tenji, but Onizuka has a solid defence—how could he have committed the deed with his makeup on, and with no one in the busy station having observed his movements from his room to the president's, two floors above?

The devil's due: outlining a murder plan

While less musically inclined than "The Karaoke Box Murder", "The Devil of the TV Station" certainly has its points of interest. The modus operandi of the murder is a tightrope act involving multiple moving parts and actors—makeup, impersonation, origami, rulers, raincoats, and restaurant delivery people. In particular, I like the rationale behind the use of three different restaurants to deliver food. However, with a limited cast, the case unfolds much like an episode of Columbo or Furuhata Ninzaburou—here too, the audience is made aware pretty early on who the culprit is; only the method remains to be uncovered. 

A dash of tragedy is added in the murder motive—it is here that Aoyama critiques the excesses and manipulation of musical fandom. At a time when Onizuka had lost his voice three years ago, a young girl took her own life and 'offered her blood' as a sacrifice to aid Onizuka's recovery—a horrific event stemming from a stunt by Tenji who left messages in Onizuka's name (unbeknownst to the singer himself) on online forums and message boards exhorting the followers to offer sacrifices. The event leaves a terrible scar on Onizuka himself, who visits the girl's parents, then spirals into depression, and loses his creative songwriting impulses, leading to a dissociation between him as a person and the persona he portrays and the lyrics (on curses, death, destruction, and violence) that he sings as Satan Onizuka. He is further trapped between a rock and a hard place when Tenji denies him permission to hold a farewell performance for Styx III, instead threatening him with legal action if he chose to walk out before the contract extracted. It is this toxic cocktail of tipping points that ultimately leads to the events of "The Devil of the TV Station".

Tragedy strikes again in "The Unfriendly Girls' Band" (manga chapters: 936–938, anime episodes: 836–837), which begins with the big-mouthed Sonoko all gung-ho on starting a high school girls' band. After being embarrassed in Café Poirot (below the Kogorou detective agency) for not being able to play the guitar, Sonoko saves face due to the intervention of Tooru Amuro (or Rei Furuya), another notable detective in the Detective Conan canon, who instructs her on the need to practice. An inspired Sonoko proceeds to drag her classmates, Ran and Sera Masumi (yet another detective), along with Tooru and Conan, to a recording studio. Unfortunately, the rooms all being booked, they have to wait for a fair amount of time during which they encounter a girls' band whose guitarist rebukes all the members for their flawed rehearsals in preparation for a funeral concert for their deceased bandmate, a singer. They adjourn for a 10-minute break, and during which interval Sonoko tries to select the preferred members and their roles for the band. Their reverie is rudely interrupted by a scream—and when Conan, Tooru, and Sera rush to the scene, they find one of the members of the girls' band they had seen previously slumped over the drum set, after being strangled. The CCTV camera footage should have captured the scene and action of crime—either directly or through a reflection on the mirror behind the performance area—but half of the camera was covered by a phone on a selfie stick attached to the mic to record the rehearsal, while curtains had been drawn covering the mirror, on the victim's request. As a result, the footage captured only the victim's slumped-over state without a trace of the perpetrator.

The investigation in progress

While "The Karaoke Box Murder" exploits the habitual itches of performers, "The Unfriendly Girls' Band" makes great use of positional awareness and knowledge of how a band sets itself up on the stage, to figure out how the position of the recording phone was manipulated and whodunnit in the absence of proper CCTV footage. I am less sold, however, on the mechanics of making the murder weapon disappear—a method which, while admittedly inspired, seems improbable to pull off perfectly, without hiccups, in that short a time-frame.

Like the previous two stories, "The Unfriendly Girls' Band" also unfolds as a revenge tragedy due to the underlying motive and backstory. At the centre of it all is a dual misconception regarding the death of their previous bandmate, the singer who had damaged her voice while acting on the advice of the current case's victim. The singer patched things up with the bandmate who had erroneously guided her, and started following the instructions to heal herself up to a t. However, she died while trying to save a boy from a car collision, instead of shouting to warn him—an incident that leads the present case's victim to feel even more guilty. Another bandmate (the perpetrator of the current case) remains unaware of these details, having gone into shock, and solely blames her fellow performer for driving the singer to commit suicide. This intersecting maze of emotions and mistaken beliefs ultimately culminates in the tragic events seen in this storyline.

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Songs and music tunes are often believed to bring out human emotions and sentiments in a manner that connects, either viscerally or transcendentally, with the audience at large. However, as these three stories depict, Aoyama subverts these expectations by turning music, songs, and the musical persona into tools of miscommunication and misunderstanding that shed a light on the blind spots that even music and songs cannot illuminate. By purposefully showing the pressures and strains that come with musical performances and showmanship, Aoyama skilfully explores what happens when the musical product is based upon foundations of tragedy, mistaken perceptions and the unpredictable human nature—and how these murky associations can cause a presumably liberating force such as music and songs to be bogged down by the all-too-sordid reality of crime and murder. 

A Night of Fright Is No Delight

Of the many reasons why I still relish a good ol' Scooby Doo yarn is the fact that the original series plays it remarkably straight with urban legends. Whenever Scooby and gang roll into a ghost town, abandoned mine, haunted film set or museum, they are led right into the thick of things, no questions asked. There is, above all, a superb level of suspension of disbelief—an undertaker in a mine or a ghostly space-pilot in an abandoned airfield are allowed to terrorise people in the vicinity unabated, leading to the emergence of rumours and urban legends, till Scooby, Shaggy, Velma, Daphne, and Fred somehow stumble on such occurrences and solve them with a combination of luck and logic. The cast of the early Scooby Doo series have well-defined roles to which they stick faithfully, enabling audiences to appreciate the diversity in the visualisation of monsters, the tricks and tropes employed, and the many wacky ways in which the incidents are solved, even though the episodes follow a fairly repetitive formula/script.

Recently, I rediscovered this feeling of wacky, undisguised delight when I stumbled upon Nemoto Shou's manga Kaiki Tantei Sharaku Homura (Sharaku Homura: Detective of the Uncanny) in an online forum. As it turns out, Shou's Sharaku Homura is one of these rare instances of a self-published (doujinshi) manga series not only winning an award, but also getting picked up by a major publisher. So, what's the deal about this series?

The best way I can describe Sharaku Homura: Detective of the Uncanny is as an inspired, successful blend of Scooby Doo aesthetics, the atmosphere of a Kindaichi Shōnen no Jikenbo story, and the mechanics of Anraku Isu Tantei (Armchair Detective), a classic and critically acclaimed Japanese detective show. The characters in Sharaku Homura—and the villains in particular—seem to be obviously inspired by Scooby Doo characters. While the titular character, Sharaku Homura, possesses a mix of Velma-like curiosity and scientific know-how, and the damsel-in-distress aspect of Daphne, the villains boast of names and gimmicks that would be perfectly at home in the Scooby Doo universe.

The first story, scanlated (a process of fan-made editing and translation) as "The One-Eyed Clown", takes us to the Shimoyama Prefecture where rumours of a certain one-eyed clown starts spreading. This clown is said to appear in the dead of the night, chasing people down with severed heads and other human parts, stealing Buddha statues, before disappearing like smoke. And, according to the word on the street, the clown may also have exacted bloody revenge on its parents by killing them and gouging one of their eyes!

Clowns are scary and evil: (left) the Ghost Clown (from the Scooby Doo episode, "Bedlam in the Big Top") and (right) Sharaku Homura's one-eyed clown

Things get a little too close for comfort for our protagonists from Shimoyama Middle School—Sharaku Homura (of the Experiment Club) and Yamasaki Yousuke (of the Karate Club)—when the clown appears in front of them at night, and proceeds to disappear from a dead-end alley. While the impossibility is solved by the logical Homura in fairly quick order by analysing some possible scenarios, it makes excellent use of the visual format, providing a sample of what the series specialises in.

The first disappearing act

Not surprisingly, the disappearing acts soon escalate to the level of murder, when the clown brutally impales Kasugai Isamu, the school's maths teacher, in a graveyard in front of Homura and Yousuke, and escapes again. What follows next is a game of cat and mouse, with the clown looking to eliminate Homura via elaborate traps. The first time, Homura is lured to a 'doll house' via a fake invitation to Isamu's wake. She is nearly buried in a coffin before Yousuke rescues her.

Murder, bloody murder!

The next trap is even more diabolical and features another disappearing act by the clown. Homura is led to an empty school classroom with a single entrance and no means of exit. The figure of a clown with a barely visible message on a faraway blackboard beckons her to come closer, but for some unfathomable reason, Homura gets scared and runs off from the classroom. As it transpires, she escaped with her life.

The second disappearing act

For me, the favourite aspect of the story, apart from its fast pacing and dense plotting, is the minute attention devoted to visual detail. The steps leading to Homura's deduction—the discrepancies and the clues—are all depicted clearly, with multiple 'flashback' panels that even state which page the clue is located. This treatment makes Sharaku Homura a fair-play mystery series that does not withhold vital information to its readers—much in the manner of Anraku Isu Tantei.

The art of clueing: Flashback scenes and panels solve cases in (left) "Anraku Isu Tantei and the UFO" and (right) "The One-Eyed Clown" (Sharaku Homura series) 

Like Scooby Doo, this story is best enjoyed if one is willing to suspend disbelief for certain aspects—such as the logistics of adults dressing up as over-the-top scary monsters, the strength required to carry out the impaling with that weapon, and the fact that an entire police contingent was willing to listen to the explanations of a criminal who had confessed, instead of first securing him and doing a body check. These reservations aside, the story made me an instant Sharaku Homura fan. The distinctive, DIY-style art, the Kindaichi-esque atmosphere, the use of characters who stick to particular roles, and the fair-play modus operandi make for a refreshing, heady combination that scratches my mystery-solving itch. Highly recommended!