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Done with this week’s reading. Felt like basically nothing happened in this part. I still took some notes, so here goes:
Who the fuck names their car model クラウン, it sent me for a short loop trying to understand what is happening since I kept thinking “clown???”
They say closing the door from the outside with a thread is impossible. There goes one of my theories -.-. I’m a little surprised that they are not more creative in thinking how the fire could have been started and only think about matches and such for a delayed fire.
I’m still getting used to the police talk. I somehow find it funny that the perp is a ホシ and the case is a ヤマ
The story about the 蝶々岳神隠し was still pretty vague. No idea how it connects to our people yet. Is 冬樹 one of our protagonists? Doubt it.
There really wasn’t anything happening in this part. The only things notable are the tires/cutting line to isolate them, and putting the master key in the safe. Regarding last week’s discussion: the pill case still seems to be in his toilet water flush thingy (what’s the name in English??) but he didn’t check inside the case. There were probably many more hints given. But overall I found this part pretty dull and hope that the pace picks up in next week’s reading again.
On the bright side, you know it now! This car model has come up more than once for me. I feel like there is a random part of my brain dedicated to Japanese cars now
I think I’d just call it the water tank or reservoir?
By far the highest frequency of 閂 I’ve seen in anything so far! I’m sure Akashelia is also thrilled at representation of a very great kanji
They keep putting in more and more meta-references to it being within a mystery novel, such as this line I liked
いままさに小説の中でしか起こりえないような事件を私たちは目の当たりにしているんです
I liked the deviation to the ski-town murders, a good old campfire story which I’m sure will be connected in somehow, but probably in an unexpected way, so I won’t bother thinking about how it’ll happen.
Obviously there’s something going on with 円香 and 酒泉 but I reckon it’s something more complex than just them being friends/lovers, maybe they’re both following post-mortem orders? Not sure.
I like seeing 月夜’s total lack of self-awareness to the fact that everyone is at very real risk (seemingly) of being murdered, just being wrapped up in her attempts to solve the mystery. Although 加々見 is starting to grind on my nerves just a little, he was too unnecessarily rude this chapter. If him being the police link wasn’t there, I’d guess he’d be next getting 殺した’d, but because of that I don’t think he will be. Maybe 左京 or someone like that (assuming more people will get murdered, which seems an almost certainty).
I was wondering if this kind of situation had a term in the mystery novel world, similar to 密室, seeing as it was very similar in 赤川 次郎’s 『あなたも殺人犯になれる!』 (strangers locked up together, no way of communication with the outside, can’t leave because of the weather, and people are getting murdered). Got the answer in that line.
陸の孤島というわけですね！ 〝嵐の山荘もの〟のクローズドサークルで起こる連続殺人の舞台として、代表的なシチュエーションです！
クラウン is such a confusing word. Just had it in FFI today and wasn’t sure if it was crown or clown. (I think crown, but not even sure the sentence is なんでも沼の洞窟にある「クラウン」があれば、城が再建できるって話よ)
Here it is just CROWN, a car from Toyota. ATENZA is a Mazda. At least in the context of tires being punctured, a search for クラウン 車 was fast enough to get what it was.
I’m ashamed to say that I still haven’t memorized its reading despite the high amount of times I’ve seen it by now wait let me try.. かんぬき? Maybe I finally got it!! Tried to memorize it with the mnemonic of a sensitive (感-) ta-nuki during this week’s reading, we’ll see if it sticks…
Speaking of words, more snow words, nice!
雪道 ・ ゆきみち
雪山 ・ せつざん
吹雪 ・ ふぶき
雪形 ・ ゆきがた
And what’s ガイシャ ? around the beginning of section 3
午前六時に、ガイシャはダイニングに入ったってわけか
I was wondering a bit why the editor was a character at all in this book, I couldn’t see how his occupation would bring anything to the story, but I guess I see why now, the story of what happened 13 years ago was interesting!
夢読 is depicted as hysterical but I think I would also prefer to go to my room, lock myself up and not come out until the police arrives. Can probably survive fine 2 days without eating.
Also I think I would have found a way to distribute the 2 keys randomly in a way that nobody knows who ends up having them.
I’m not familiar at all with 合気道 so I watched this video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zvHtX_mwacE
I still don’t understand what it is (are they fake fighting or dancing or real fighting ?) but it was fascinating to watch.
Wait until you hear my new theory: the butler was 冬樹大介 in hiding and 巴 killed him because he killed her mom.
Slang for 被害者. Pretty common in cop shows and such. If it interests anyone, here is a super comprehensive list of this type of slang: 業界用語・スラング「警察・マスコミ」編 | 令和日本blog
(I just saw @downtimes beat me by a minute but I’m still posting cause the link is handy)
Hmm, not to sure about that one. As far as I know, they worked together for a long time already. But maybe your theory is that she used the other murder to deflect suspicions from herself? You think she got that information recently, or she already knew it long ago and only used the event as a cover?
I had no idea of what ホシ meant and the kindle dictionary wasn’t helping me whatsover, so thanks for this!
I also found it quite strange that everyone would just accept that they have an alibi for being together, when they are literally co-workers (friends?) who could easily be covering for each other or in it together.
加々見 is quite an insufferable character for me, but my guess on our next victim has to be 夢読 - she’s just standing out too much in this chapter (despite, somehow, being the only one with a reasonable reaction to being stuck somewhere with 2 murder victims IMO), and the setup of going to hide alone in her room seems like a lovely way to get another closed-door murder.
It’s a style of martial arts, more defense focused. From what I understand, there are many styles/schools, but it’s also quite focused on throws, which is why people were on the floor a lot in that video (I’m not that familiar with it either, but I do practice some other martial arts so I’ve heard of it)
That also makes sense, 夢読 wouldn’t surprise me, I just think that the story kind of needs someone like her to be around talking about bad omens and acting scared like a normal person, so my guess is maybe she won’t die quite yet.
Also about her, given 一条 was one of the people she trusted enough to have a key, I thought it would be funny if both people she trusts with one end up being the murderer 1 and murderer 2, I could see that happening.
I disagree, they just told her that if she goes to her room she will be the first to die, as this book is very meta, I think that’s what’s going to happen!
I could also see that happening. Very ironic for a psychic to be that wrong
The only reason they know the road is cut is because the police detective said that it was told to him when he called the police station, but this wasn’t on loud speaker unlike the call to the key company.
I was thinking about that because I thought it would have been strange for such a big coincidence to happen. That would be a very fortuitous avalanche!
That being said all of their phones were still working at that time, it would have been easy for them to check I presume? But it wasn’t mentioned. I also find the explanation for how 加々見 got involved with the missing person case to be very short and generic. Maybe he had other motives?
I still think the lensing theory that was brought up last week by @downtimes is the most likely explanation for the fire, but apparently the murderer may have used the pollen from the plants to accelerate it? Did they want the alarm to ring at a precise moment? Why? Is it important alibi-wise?
Other theory: 月夜 wanted a super cool mystery to solve and she took the matter into her own hands. Maybe she saw the murder of island guy and the “closed circle” situation and thought “well it would be terrible if this mass-slaughter scenario went to waste” and started plotting convoluted murder schemes.
I maintain that you don’t need a string at all, just carefully close the door with the rod balancing against the door frame and it will fall into place. The fact that the author bothered to add a drawing of it makes me think there has to be a mechanical trick anyway. Otherwise who cares?
I really like “huis clos” but it doesn’t really have an equivalent in English. The Japanese should have borrowed that instead!
You can load JMDict on kindle (at least on the real Kindle device, maybe not the various apps):
By the way another crazy idea that I considered (but doesn’t really work) would be for our protagonist to have a Dr Jekyll and Mister Hyde style situation going on where he would murder people in his sleep (note that he goes to bed in the middle of the day at the end of this week’s part…). I only considered that because of the weird “ore” intrusions in the narration. Doesn’t seem to work with his alibi though.
True you could do that for the food. For the water I don’t think it’s a problem, they seem to have their own bathrooms.
Kinda, he did collapse on the bed and then just woke up there again, could have been some loss of memories in between. And I do think the fact that 月夜 and the doctor were talking “at the time” of the second murder is more a lure than a proof. Could be why the alarm was triggered at that moment, if not and if it was discovered much later, 月夜 couldn’t “prove” that she was busy at the time
The murderer managed to cut the phone lines, they can probably cut the water too if it came to that.
By the way I’m really enjoying this book, Japanese-learning-wise. It’s basically the perfect level for me: it’s a lot of text but I can understand pretty much everything without too much trouble. I can already feel a notable difference in terms of reading confidence and pace since week 1. I was a bit fearful to dare attempt an ABC but it turned out to be exactly what I needed, I think.
Week 3
the sentence is 
wait let me try.. かんぬき? Maybe I finally got it!! Tried to memorize it with the mnemonic of a sensitive (感-) ta-nuki during this week’s reading, we’ll see if it sticks…
(I’m not that familiar with it either, but I do practice some other martial arts so I’ve heard of it)