In this 2nd book (that's been translated into English) in the 'Detective Kaga' series, the Tokyo homicide cop investigates the murder of a woman. The book can be read as a standalone.
*****
When a middle-aged woman named Mineko Mitsui is murdered in her apartment in the Kodenmacho district of Tokyo, homicide detective Kyoichiro Kaga - a newcomer to the local precinct - uses his Sherlockian skills to track down the killer.
Rather than zero in directly on the victim, Kaga starts by investigating oddities surrounding the case. These issues are connected to people who knew Mitsui, and specialty shops in the nearby Nihonbashi neighborhood. Thus Kaga interviews people and visits stores, day after day, to look into the following:
- The movements of Mitsui's insurance agent, Mr. Takura, who visited her on the day of the murder. Mr. Takura stopped at a rice cracker shop on his way to Kodenmacho, but the timeline of his movements doesn't add up, and Kaga has to figure out why.
-Ten snack cakes were found in Mitsui's apartment, seven with sweet bean paste filling and three without. One of the cakes had been doctored, and Kaga has to find out where the cakes were bought, who tampered with them, and why.
- Mitsui had recently purchased an expensive new pair of kitchen scissors from a cutlery shop, though she already had a serviceable pair of kitchen shears. Kaga needs to solve the puzzle of the second scissors. 
- The owner of a clock repair shop, called Mr. Terada, would take his dog for a walk at 5:30 every afternoon. Mitsui often went out at the same time, and the two pedestrians would pass one another and nod hello. Mr. Terada seems to be mistaken about exactly where he saw Mitsui on the day of the murder, and Kaga needs to find out why.
- Mitsui would stop by a pastry shop every evening, where she would purchase cream puffs, her favorite sweets. Mitsui usually exchanged a few pleasantries with the bakery clerk, and even gave the girl a small 'good luck' gift. Kaga visits the pastry shop to speak to the girl.
- Mitsui was estranged from her twenty-year-old son Koki - an aspiring actor, and divorced from Koki's father Naohiro - a businessman. Though mother and son hadn't spoken in years, Mitsui moved to Koki's Kodenmacho neighborhood without informing her offspring - perhaps hoping to make amends. 
Mitsui was also seeking to redraft her divorce settlement with Naohiro, in an effort to get more money.
Kaga looks into these matters.
- Mitsui had recently become reacquainted with an old college friend named Tamiko Yoshioka, who worked as a translator. 
In college, Mitsui had also hoped to become a translator, and Tamiko promised to help Mitsui get translation work and get on her feet financially. Then Tamiko's situation changed, and she was planning to move away.....causing friction between the women. Kaga investigates this.
- Kaga visits the home of a young married couple, Reiko and Katsuya Kishida, who have a very lavish lifestyle. 
The couple's little boy was recently gifted with a wooden top by his grandfather - who happens to be the business accountant for Mitsui's ex-husband. The wooden top doesn't work properly, and Kaga visits shops that sell these toys. 
In the course of his investigation, Kaga gathers information and meets a wide variety of people - including store owners, shop employees, husbands, wives, in-laws, mothers, fathers, grandmothers, granddaughters, and so on. Many of these characters have secrets - some big, some small - that come to light along the way.....and some of them are very surprising.
The author artfully connects what, at first, seems to be a series of disparate events into a unified whole.....from which the murderer emerges.
I enjoyed the book and recommend it to fans of unusual mysteries.
Rating: 3.5 stars
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