The Devotion of Suspect X Book Review

After reading The Devotion of Suspect X by Keigo Higashino, translated by Alexander O. Smith, I realized that I can’t put down a good mystery book. This mystery novel was an enjoyable read that I am glad I gave a chance.

What is The Devotion of Suspect X About?

Yasuko’s life follows a routine as she works at a bento shop in Tokyo, raising her daughter by herself. But things change drastically when her ex-husband shows up at her job one day and he doesn’t plan to leave her alone.

It is up to Detective Kusanagi to solve the mystery of the murder of a man that is found dead under mysterious circumstances. He doesn’t believe Yasuko’s alibi and tries to crack the case with the help of his friend, a university physics professor. But his friend thinks that whoever is behind the murder is brilliant and does his own digging into the murder and his old friend from college. 

Commentary

The murderer is told in the first few pages of the novel and yet that takes nothing away from this novel. What ensues is the faceoff of two geniuses as we begin to learn just how meticulous the planning is. No matter how many mystery novels and murder novels you have read, this novel will still surprise you.

I don’t think I was as impressed with a plot as I was with this novel. Keigo Higashino has written an amazing murder mystery that is worth reading by anyone that loves Agatha Christie novels or just a good mystery. As much as I tried to put the novel down, I knew I had to keep reading and it was worth it as the plot twists kept on coming and I was more shocked after every one of them.

And like any Agatha Christie novel, the clues were there all along in plain sight. The author gave us the tools and yet I was fooled like everyone else. This is a novel that I will be thinking about for a long time and I don’t know if another murder plot will live up to this one.

Awards

As you may have guessed, this is a Japanese novel which was first published in 2005. It went on the win the Naoki Prize and the Honkaku Mystery Award. These are highly prestigious awards and after reading the novel, I am not surprised. The novel went on to sell over 800,000 copies in its first year.

Conclusion

If you love mystery novels, then this is a novel you have to read. It is brilliant and the plot, writing, and characters make this novel a classic in my opinion. And I can’t wait to see what other novels Keigo Higashino has written since then.