"With a pinch of John Dickson Carr and a dash of Agatha Christie solver of impossible crimes"
Kosuke Kindaichi returns for another murder mystery ( The New York Times ) As several bodies
are discovered staged in bizarre poses echoing the lyrics of a children's song the quirky
endearing Japanese detective must string together the clues to solve this fiendish puzzle The
scruffy detective Kosuke Kindaichi returns to solve another satisfying stand-alone murder
mystery. An old friend of Kindaichi's invites the detective to visit the remote mountain
village of Onikobe the site of a 20-year-old unsolved murder case. But no sooner has Kindaichi
in the village than a new series of murders strikes - several bodies are discovered staged in
bizarre poses and it soon becomes clear that the victims are being killed using methods that
eerily echo the lyrics of an old local children's song... As the legendary sleuth investigates
he soon realises that he must unravel the dark and tangled history of the village as well as
that of its feuding families to get to the truth. The Little Sparrow Murders is the sixth
classic Detective Kindaichi mystery to be published by Pushkin Vertigo. Kosuke Kindaichi is
Japan's best-loved and most famous fictional sleuth and Seishi Yokomizo one of the country's
greatest crime writers. His whodunnits have sold an astonishing 55 million copies in his home
country. Yokomizo is perhaps the most popular and feted crime writer in his country's history.
His richly atmospheric classic mysteries are a treat for any fan of Golden Age whodunits
taking the reader all over post-war Japan from remote mountain villages to pirate-plagued
islands and the bustling streets of Tokyo. Yokomizo loved to craft ingenious puzzle plots
inspired by the greats of British and American crime such as John Dickson Carr or Agatha
Christie while his detective Kosuke Kindaichi is everything a reader could want from a
sleuth: brilliant eccentric charming and unassuming enough to be fatally underestimated by
many a murderer. . .
