{"id":6396,"date":"2017-02-23T07:52:04","date_gmt":"2017-02-23T12:52:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=6396"},"modified":"2017-02-23T07:52:04","modified_gmt":"2017-02-23T12:52:04","slug":"blue-light-yokohama","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=6396","title":{"rendered":"*****Blue Light Yokohama"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Tokyo

photo: mytokyoguide.wordpress.com, used with permission<\/p><\/div>\n

By Nicol\u00e1s Obreg\u00f3n \u2013 What an entertaining debut! Told almost exclusively from the perspective of Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department Inspector Kosuke Iwata, it\u2019s a multilayered police procedural involving murder, official corruption, and dangerous secrets.<\/p>\n

A brief prologue set in 1996 describes the death of a woman who jumped from a dangling cable car into the sea, despite the efforts of police detective Hideo Akashi to save her. Fifteen years later, Akashi is investigating the quadruple murder of a Korean family. In the midst of his investigation, he commits suicide by jumping off Tokyo\u2019s Rainbow Bridge (pictured above). No one knows why. This theme of falling pervades the novel and ties together many of its strands, past and present.<\/p>\n

The brass at the police department asks their newest detective, U.S.-trained (and therefore highly suspect) Iwata to pick up Akashi\u2019s investigation of the family\u2019s murder. Iwata is aided by Assistant Inspector Sakai, transferred from the Missing Persons department to work with him. These two inexperienced homicide detectives are assigned such a complex investigation because the department is short-handed, having lost Akashi, and is focused instead on another of his cases, the mysterious death of high-profile actress. A little racism creeps in, as well; as Iwata\u2019s supervisor explains, \u201cThe family were Korean, so not exactly front-page news.\u201d<\/p>\n

Iwata and Sakai manage to get along rather well, considering. He is haunted by memories of his childhood in an orphanage, and she is a feisty young woman whose reflexive prickliness provides a lively counterpoint of humor. (I loved her!)<\/p>\n

Iwata and Sakai haven\u2019t made much progress in their investigation when the lonely widow of a judge is murdered. Striking details at the crime scene are similar to the Korean family\u2019s case. Though Iwata and Sakai energetically pursue multiple lines of inquiry, they cannot begin to figure out what links these deaths until he starts breaking rules.<\/p>\n

The author, who has lived in Japan, not only evocatively describes the physical and social settings of Tokyo, Kyoto, and Hong Kong, he also carefully explores Iwata\u2019s complex interior life and motivations. The atmosphere he creates is dense with possibilities and a bit dreamlike.\u00a0 This is in part because a dozen or so mysteriously poetic lines repeatedly float through the detective\u2019s mind: \u201cThe lights of the city are so pretty\u201d; \u201cI walk and walk, swaying, like a small boat in your arms.\u201d You don\u2019t learn the origin of these lines until well along\u2014a song that is the source of the book\u2019s title (hear it here<\/a>).<\/p>\n

But Obreg\u00f3n is a more subtle writer than that, and the title also echoes other blue lights. A local suicide prevention program uses them, based on the supposition that the color blue is calming. The flashing blue lights of police cars, another recurrent Obreg\u00f3n image, would belie that assumption. Blue Light Yokohama<\/em> is an immersive police procedural that uses its exotic setting and distinctive characters to great effect.
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