Point Zero - by Seicho Matsumoto (Paperback)

About the Book

"A triumph by Seicho Matsumoto, the master of Japanese mystery writing. A beautifully written crime novel that takes on the taboo of Japanese prostitution catering to GIs during the American post-war occupation. First published in Japanese in 1959, the novel abandoned the template of closed-room mysteries so popular in pre-war Japan to embrace social criticism. In a radical departure from tradition, the novel has a female protagonist, a housewife seeking to find her missing husband. Respectful of the proprieties expected of a Japanese woman of the time, but stubborn, intrepid and a naturally intuitive sleuth. Tokyo, 1958. Teiko marries Kenichi Uhara, ten years her senior, an advertising man recommended by a go-between. After a four-day honeymoon, Kenichi vanishes. Teiko travels to the coastal and snow-bound city of Kanazawa, where Kenichi was last seen, to investigate his disappearance. When Kenichi's brother comes to help her, he is murdered, poisoned in his hotel room. Soon, Teiko discovers that her husband's disappearance is tied up with the so-called "pan-pan girls", women who worked as prostitutes catering to American GIs after the war. Now, ten years later, as the country is recovering, there are those who are willing to take extreme measures to hide that past." --

Book Synopsis

"A master crime writer...Seichō Matsumoto's thrillers dissect Japanese society."--The New York Times. A beautifully written mystery novel that takes on the taboo of Japanese prostitution catering to GIs during the American post-war occupation.

Tokyo 1958, Teiko marries Kenichi Uhara, ten years her senior, an advertising man recommended by an intermediary. After a four-day honeymoon, Kenichi vanishes. Teiko travels to the coastal and snow-bound city of Kanazawa, where Kenichi was last seen, to investigate his disappearance.

She discovers he had been a police officer in Tokyo after the war, keeping watch over pan pan girls, Japanese prostitutes catering to GIs. Some of these women have created a new life in Kanazawa and may have taken extreme measures to hide their past.

"Do you aspire to be a connoisseur of the best international crime fiction? If so, Seicho Matsumoto's Point Zero should be on your bedside table. Become acquainted with a crime master." Financial Times

Review Quotes

Praise for Point Zero:

"We travel on a slow-paced and absorbing journey through a Japan that fascinates but no longer exists (any more than 1958 Britain any longer exists)...to a very Japanese conclusion." CrimeTime

"Do you aspire to be a connoisseur of the best international crime fiction? If so, Seicho Matsumoto's Point Zero should be on your bedside table. Become acquainted with a crime master." Financial Times

"Matsumoto's love for the rugged, wintry Japanese landscape is evident in his descriptions, which are verbal equivalents of traditional Japanese art." NY Journal of Books

"Along with an intriguing mystery, Matsumoto gives an unobtrusive but fascinating lesson in the history and culture of the period between the Japan we know today and its immediate past." Morning Star

Praise for Matsumoto:

"A master crime writer...Seichō Matsumoto's thrillers dissect Japanese society."--The New York Times Book Review

"He writes in the classic tradition of Georges Simenon's Inspector Maigret of Paris; Nicholas Freeling's Inspector Van der Valk in Amsterdam; Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo's Superintendent Beck in Stockholm; Magdalen Nabb's Marshal Guarnaccia in Florence, and P. D. James's Chief Inspector Dalgliesh in England."--New York Times

Praise for A Quiet Place by Matsumoto:

"A surprising and immensely satisfying resolution that flows naturally from the book's complex characterizations. Readers will agree that Matsumoto deserves his reputation as Japan's Georges Simenon." --STARRED review Publishers Weekly

"There's an element of the exquisite poetic Haiku form in the book, in the details that turn the story in new directions, and the tiniest mistakes that lead to tragic and unforeseen outcomes."--Spectator

About the Author

The Author and the Translator

Seichō Matsumoto (1909-1982) was Japan's most successful mystery writer. His first detective novel, Points and Lines, sold over a million copies in Japan. Vessel of Sand, published in English as Inspector Imanishi Investigates in1989, sold over four million copies and became a movie box-office hit. Bitter Lemon published his novel A Quiet Place in 2016.

Louise Heal Kawai comes from Manchester. She has spent the past twenty years Japan and currently lives in Yokohama. Her translations include Daido Tamaki's Milk, Tendo Shoko's best-selling autobiography Yakuza Moon, and for Bitter Lemon, Matsumoto's A Quiet Place.