The 4th book in the Bizarre House Murders (sometimes known as The House Murders) series by Japanese author Yukito Ayatsuji. A well known writer of Japanese detective and mystery fiction, he's an adherent to the classic rules of the genre, always incorporates reflective and poignant elements, and in this series has constructed a series of elaborate locked room settings (see below).
In this outing the Clock House is a remote, custom built house with multiple wings (there's a floorplan to explain it all), commissioned by a father to fill with priceless timepieces from around the world, and as a home for himself and two children. The house is said to be haunted by the spirit of his daughter who died, tragically, before she could marry at the same very young age as her mother. Already dying from a mysterious illness, her death was said to have been precipitated by a traumatic event. Her father now dead as well, the house is home to a couple of staff members and a young boy when a team of ghosthunters is assembled by a publisher, intent on staying in one wing of the house along with a famous medium. They are locked into that wing, not to be disturbed for a number of days, during which a seance is held, a medium disappears, and then people start to die horribly, in seemingly impossible ways.
In a classic locked room environment, with a team of people who are either locked in with a killer, or the targets of a killer who can seemingly walk through walls, the solution to this mystery lies not just in how or who, but why. In the end the why becomes one of the most important parts of the entire argument, as the full tragic story of the family who owned the house is revealed, the construction of the house becomes more obvious, and one of the people outside the locked wing - the detective Shimada Kiyoshi - discovers the horror that has occurred within. Which discovery doesn't automatically present the answer to the puzzle, that comes down to some very clear thinking, and acute powers of observation and logic.
A fascinating entry in a fascinating series, these are slower and more reflective crime fiction novels than the high body count would telegraph. The author is well known for being a renowned member of a new traditionalist movement in Japanese Crime Writing, Honkaku or fair play, as was common or favoured in the so called "Golden Age" of crime writing.
The series in order is:
The Decagon House Murders - set on a lonely, rockbound island.
The Mill House Murders - set in a remote house with a reclusive, heavily scarred protagonist. (I need to reread this one)
The Labyrinth House Murders - another remote, secluded house where a party turns to murder. (I haven't read this one yet)
The Clock House Murders - the 4th in the series so of course I read this before the The Labyrinth House Murders....
The Clock House Murders
The remote Clock House is filled with priceless timepieces from across the world. It is also rumoured to be haunted by the spirit of a dead girl. A team of ghosthunters visit the mansion to investigate, but their stay has barely begun when one of them is gruesomely murdered, and the survivors realize that they are trapped inside the house with a killer...
As the murderer's bloody spree continues, the team are picked off one by one. Can the brilliant detective Shimada Kiyoshi crack the enigma of the Clock House before all those inside have been slain? And can you guess the solution before he does?
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