Next week, the 2022 Qatar World Cup will open, and the quadrennial sports event, whether you are a fan or not, will be lively.
This year's World Cup starts after 6 p.m. and lasts until the wee hours of the morning, and apart from having to stay up late, this schedule is quite friendly to Chinese fans. Of course, during the competition, the idea of reading a book at night is probably dispelled.
Then, in this column, you may wish to take advantage of the fact that the World Cup has not yet begun, to recommend a few sports-related mystery novels for everyone, I will introduce a masterpiece according to different sports, and feel the atmosphere of sports competitions in advance.
Football: Kotaro Isaka
《单challenge》, by Kotaro Isaka, Sora Hoshino, Shinsei Publishing Co., Ltd., February 2015.
This novel is composed of three short stories "PK", "Superman" and "Secret Messenger", these three stories seem to be unrelated, but in the end they are connected by a wonderful event, which is the author Kotaro Isaka's best writing, "Genius Robber Reverses the Earth", "Gorgeous Life", "A Punk Saves the Earth" and other works We can see Isaka's unique layout ability.
The title of the book "Heads-Up" is taken from the first "PK". But the translation of the Chinese "singled out" is not accurate, and its real meaning in the book is Penalty Kick, the "penalty" in football. So, if the book Chinese translated as "Penalty", the atmosphere of the World Cup suddenly became strong.
The background of the story is the 2002 World Cup in France - this is the author's overhead setting, in fact, the 2002 World Cup is hosted in Japan and South Korea - in the World Cup qualifiers, the ace of the Japanese national team, Ozu, gets a penalty opportunity, whether the penalty can be scored will be the key to the game.
What do you think is the success rate of penalty kicks? The answer given through the mouths of characters in the book is 80%, but the penalty kick actually tests not the mentality of the goalkeeper, but the penalty player. The goalkeeper can't keep the penalty, no one will blame him, it's too difficult, so the mentality will be very relaxed. But the players are different, especially in such an important game, the whole country, including the prime minister, is paying attention to Ozu's kick, and the pressure can be imagined. It was such an important moment, but the performance of ace player Ozu in this game was very weak, because his son had just been kidnapped two days ago... And the kidnapper's demand, not the ransom, is Ozu's performance in the game.
Whether Ozu can withstand the pressure penalty is the suspense that appears at the beginning of the book "Heads-up", and Kotaro Isaka is not a simple sports novel, the result of the penalty will be revealed soon, but the story has just begun. The outcome of this penalty will affect the fate of all mankind.
This is a standard Kotaro Isaka-style novel, and his novel does not have many elements of reasoning, but there are enough suspense support, changes, and super unfolding that keeps turning up. When you finally roll out the entire worldview, you will find that this is a grand narrative that is almost a sci-fi setting, but it is always the daily choices of ordinary people that affect the ending.
This book can be seen as a sister to "A Punk Saves the Earth", the entry point of "Punk" is music, the entry point of "PK" is the World Cup, Kotaro Isaka uses an allegorical blood story to tell us, sincerity, kindness, courage... How these invisible qualities are transmitted through tangible means. And even if it is a small daily deed, it has enough energy to save the world.
If you like Kotaro Isaka, this book will definitely like too. If you haven't seen Kotaro Isaka's work, it's fitting to get to know him from this PK during the World Cup. At least, if you see a penalty in a World Cup, it's exciting just to think about what the players are thinking about in the last few seconds.
Golf: Agatha Christie, "Murder on the Golf Course"
"Murder on the Golf Course", by Agatha Christie, translated by Zhang Lemin, New Star Press, July 2014.
The magic of Agatha is that no matter what kind of mystery novel I want to write, go through Agatha's works, and you can always find at least one that fits the theme.
On the theme of sports alone, Agatha has written a lot of related works. For example, the favorite sport of the Victorian British elite - tennis, in "Cat in the Pigeon", "The Secret of the Blue Express", "Murder Notice", "The Mystery of the Female Corpse in the Library", "Sin in the Sun" and other works, there are tennis appearances, and even professional tennis players as the main characters. If you count chess as a sport, almost all of the plot and reasoning of the book "Hole Cards" takes place at the bridge table.
In fact, the adventurous and passionate Agatha loves sports herself, and although in the photo we see a kind, quiet old woman, in her autobiography, she also confessed that her weight made her no longer like swimming, but don't forget, she was the first recorded female surfer in history!
Among so many sports-related Agatha works, the connection between "Golf Course Murder" and sports is not the strongest, the golf course only serves as a place of crime, and the rules and competition content of golf have nothing to do with the work. But I still want to recommend this one, first, it has sports in its title; Second, this early work was written in the years when Agatha traveled around the world and went surfing in Hawaii, and Agatha's life during this period was happy, reflected in her works, and there were no questions about love and human nature, which she was better known for, and it was a very rare case of extremely high quality, and at the same time full of comedy, fantasy, and romance girly mystery novels.
Let go of all the worries of life and enjoy this game to the fullest. Isn't that the charm of the World Cup?
Wrestling: Kyosuke Buchi "Creating Violence"
"Creating Violence", by Unknown Huo Jingjie, translated by Guo Yong and Fang Ming, Beiyue Literature and Art Publishing House, March 2004.
This book was introduced as early as 2004, and the same group of Chinese readers entered the field of vision as "The Shijiakuan Incident", occupying the right time and place.
Then, Ayatsuji Yukito went on fire. And I don't know fire, and I still don't know what fire is.
The book is like what he wrote, pounce on the street uh ... Wrestled.
"Creating Violence" is a very positive social reasoning book about a new wrestler who witnesses the death of his predecessor and investigates, and in the process of investigation, he learns a lot about the shady scene of wrestling and grows personally.
Social mystery novels usually have two major themes, one is to face social issues, such as Kazuaki Takano's "The 39th Step" discusses the death penalty system, and Ye Zhenzhongxian's "Death Nurse" discusses how to take care of the elderly under the aging trend. The second is to reveal the inside story of the industry, such as Yusuke Guizhi's "Hanging Shadow of the Black Room", which profoundly exposes the chaos of the insurance industry and the extreme reactions of those involved.
"Creating Violence" is obviously about the spotlight on the niche sport of "professional wrestling", and the unspoken rules of various industries are also spicy exposed, this social school is loved by readers, and this book won the Edogawa Random Step Award.
——It is worth mentioning that "The Tokakukan Incident" was voted for the Edogawa Random Step Award, and then he was directly recommended by Shoji Shimada.
Therefore, from the evaluation system of the Japanese reasoning circle at that time, the industry chaos of "Creating Violence" + reasoning story is definitely better than the exaggerated tricks of the new Benge. "Creating Violence" does everything this type of mystery novel can do: first, the combination of trickery and industry background ensures the integrity and uniqueness of the trick, which would not have been possible if it were not for the stage of professional wrestling. Secondly, when you find that the original blood boiling game is originally manipulated by humans, as a newcomer to the industry with a dream, how to deal with it, this is quite a sense of substitution. It can be said that through the unpopular sport of "professional wrestling", Kyosuke Naru is projecting a major issue in the sports industry and even in the workplace scene throughout Japan.
However, as a mystery novel, the impact of "Creating Violence" is obviously inferior to "The Decagonal Incident", and the aesthetics of the mystery novel have begun to lean towards the new Benge at that time, and it is not surprising that a decent social faction like "Creating Violence" was snubbed by the Chinese market in comparison. It's just that when we look back after so many years, we will find that after the new Benge whirlwind blows, the current aesthetic trend of mystery novels has gradually returned to works like "Creating Violence".
Therefore, despite its unpopularity, this book is still worth recommending, and the Edogawa Random Step Award has a soft spot for social reasoning in the demystifying industry, and works such as Sakae Saito's "Murderous Chess Score" and Ryo Toba's "Kendo Murder" can also be re-read and evaluated in the same dimension.
Skiing: Keigo Higashino, "Rondo of the Wind"
"Rondo of the Wind", by Keigo Higashino, translated by Su Youyou, Modern Publishing House, 2020.
Keigo Higashino's works probably don't need to be recommended too much, and there are many series he has written, such as "Detective Galileo Series", "Kyōichiro Kaga Series", "Three Laughs Series", "Detective Club Series" and so on. In previous columns, we have introduced the "Kyōichiro Kaga series" with the most realistic characterization, and I think that the other series are not enough to represent Keigo Higashino's comprehensive ability, so even the most popular "Detective Galileo", I have not written specifically, but only a few books are introduced separately in the column on related topics.
Today, since we are talking about sports, it is inevitable that Keigo Higashino, who is not the hottest, but definitely contributes the most - the ski series!
The ski series is not actually an intentional series with a unified character, but is a combination of several books that write a large number of skiing backgrounds, and generally speaking, Keigo Higashino's ski series includes "Project Birdman", "Rondo of the Wind", "Gondola in Love", "Whose Cuckoo's Egg", "Snow Pursuit", "Challenge", etc. - even "Challenge" is not a novel at all, but a collection of sports essays by Keigo Higashino!
He writes about skiing because he really loves skiing.
He will introduce ski etiquette: "In a snow resort where many people are skiing at high speed at the same time, you must always pay attention to the situation around you, and in the event of a collision, even if you feel that it is not your fault, you must also care about each other's bodies, and say hello to each other before separating. ”
He teaches skiing skills: "Look into the distance. Raise your gaze, but you can't lean back. The body remains in a forward position, but the line of sight is raised. Otherwise, your body will lean back even more than it does now, and you won't be able to handle the skis at all. ”
He will take everyone to feel the skiing mentality: "Xiuren did not slow down and ran to the jumping platform. He already knew what to do next. The snowboard suddenly rises, Hideto calculates the time ollie, uses the elasticity of the snowboard to pass through the front of the jumping platform, the body flies into the air, and tries his best to retract his outstretched feet, just enough to touch the edge of the snowboard. Hideto keeps his balance and prepares to land on the ground – if he falls here, his achievements will be lost. ”
He shows a strange imagination of skiing: "It's hard to think about skiing in a wedding dress in heavy snow. It is also very inconvenient for those attending weddings. Standing still in the snow waiting for the bride and groom to slide down. At that time, I will definitely be anxious to want the wedding to end quickly. However, if the weather is bad, the photographers are the most culpritted. "——This paragraph, I feel that Keigo Higashino is going to get married to skiing!
Through the display of these clips, we can see that Keigo Higashino really introduces skiing as a very comprehensive sport, so why do many readers complain about his ski series?
It's because Keigo Higashino probably loves skiing so much that he sometimes forgets to write mystery novels.
Go: Shichen "The Five Elements Tower Incident"
"The Five Elements Tower Incident", by Shi Chen, New Star Press, July 2017.
This is a collection of short stories, and the "Man of Silence" is about cases related to Go. From the title of this article, we can see the tone of this novel.
碁: pronounced "chess", usually refers to the game of Go. "Silence": The meaning of silence.
The mystery novel of the same format is most easily associated with Agatha's "The Silent Witness". In Agatha's novel, the "witness" refers to a dog at the scene of the crime, called the silent witness because he witnessed the murder but could not identify the murderer. But the dog, as a "witness", also assumes the role of a kind of crime scene recorder, and eventually the detective will find out the truth based on some indirect clues it provides.
In "The Man of Silence", the key props for witnessing, recording and exposing the murder have become "Go", and "objects" are less subjective than "animals", but to some extent, the "recording" of objects is more certain, and the traces of the murderer's behavior are more obvious.
This mystery novel is born from this characteristic, and in order to create a sense of surprise and the difficulty of the logical chain, the method of "sudden reasoning" is used. That is, there is no case on the surface, the detective is just playing against the murderer, and in the process of the game, the detective suddenly pointed out that "a murder has just occurred, and further deduce who the murderer is", all clues and evidence are placed on the chessboard.
Agatha's "Hole Cards" is also through the card game to reason the identity of the murderer, but the case has already occurred at that time, the card game is more like the process of home visits, evidence collection, and reasoning in a reasoning novel, but "Silent Yuan" as a sudden reasoning, its difficulty lies in "how to reason out the hidden case", the identity of the murderer is a logical follow-up conclusion after the case appears.
In addition to the highlights combined with Go, "Silent Yuan" is also the first "sudden reasoning" in China, and before that, I had only seen "Frozen Russia" by Japanese writer Yu Azazaki. These two short stories also directly influenced and inspired my long-form mystery novel creation.
Of all the sports-related mystery novels introduced in this issue, the strength of Benge's reasoning alone is undoubtedly the strongest in "Silent Yuan".
Tennis: Ailes "Killing Intent"
"Killing Intent", by Ayers, Guizhou People's Publishing House, 2000.
Tennis is a popular sport among the British elite, so there are many novels involving tennis plots in the classical mystery novels that are also popular among the British elite. Of these novels, I personally prefer Agatha Christie's "Zero Hour", but Agatha's novel recommended another one before, so tennis left this "Killing Intent" for Ailes.
After the publication of this book, the label was "psychological crime novel", which was introduced into China very early, and I remember that the definition of "murderous novel" was directly used in publicity at that time, which shows the great influence of this work.
The story is simple, it tells the story of a husband from how he killed his wife to the step by step to develop a criminal plan and implement it. In the process, there are several small reversals in the plot, until there is a larger reversal in the plot at the end of the story.
From the point of view of the skills of the mystery novel, this work is not dazzling, but it does find a very good entry point, that is, it makes a very perfect combination of criminal psychology and "flashback reasoning".
The so-called "flashback reasoning" refers to revealing the identity of the murderer at the beginning of the story, as well as the "foolproof" modus operandi, which focuses on how the detective fights wits with the murderer in the next story, and finally grabs his horse's feet and solves the case. It's just that the perspective transformation of the detective-murderer opens up a whole new genre of mystery fiction.
Before Ayers, Austin Freeman's short story collection "Singing Bones" has completed the earliest flashback reasoning mode, but that is still in the short story era, Freeman's story, crime suspense is not prominent, he wants to introduce the scientific detective Dr. Thorndike, detective fiction is closer to a "scientific spokesperson" in Freeman's pen, completing the logic + empirical scientific "sermon" of speculative fiction.
The most influenced by Austin Freeman's flashback reasoning are the two dramas "Detective Colombo" and "Furuta Renzaburo". As a long novel, "Killing Intent" introduces a change in the "psychological" part of the flashback mode, which can of course be traced back to "Black Cat" by Edgar Allan Poe, the originator of detective novels. In "Black Cat", the male protagonist killed his wife because of alcoholism, and finally gradually collapsed psychologically, and the male protagonist of "Killing Intent" can be said to "look elegant" and reappear again.
However, because it is a long story, in the process of reading, we actually do not know whether the protagonist's crime will succeed in the end, and if so, will it bring him a satisfactory life or another deeper punishment?
These two results, we can find the answer to the same fate as "Killing Intent" in the classic crime novel "Genius Ripley" and Yusuke Takashi's debut work "Blue Flame".
There is also an interesting story about this book, the author Francis Ayers is actually a "trumpet", the author's real identity is the famous reasoning writer Anthony Berkeley, whose masterpiece "Poison Chocolate Murder" is still a classic multi-solution Benge reasoning, and he himself is also the soul and leader of the British Detective Club.
Perhaps the values of "Killing Intent" are too distorted, even for speculative writers, such a novel is enough to challenge the reader's three views, so he used another pseudonym that no one knows.
Bicycle: Shie Kondo "Sacrifice"
Sacrifice, by Shie Kondo, translated by Xu Xing, Shanghai People's Publishing House, May 2011.
Another social mystery novel in the sports industry insider genre, in the road cycling race, in order to help his teammates save their physical strength and win in the final sprint, they must have teammates to help him block the wind in front, this character is called "wind breaker".
Sacrifice refers to this group of people. Previously, there was a Chinese film called "Breaking the Wind", which was about the same theme.
Shie Kondo debuted in 1993 through the Tetsuya Catagawa Prize, as a female writer, her reasoning labels are not as strong as Agatha, Abbot Takae and others, and the level of social discussion is far inferior to Miyuki Miyabe, Kanae Minato and others, and her works are varied in style, ranging from women's delicate love emotions to industry novels such as kabuki actors and road cycling races.
"Sacrifice" as an industry mystery novel for road cycling, the theme is the story of red flowers and green leaves in team sports projects, just like writing the joy in the crosstalk theme, and if you write well, you can actually write the unique personality, team role, and the bond between the two of the funny and hilarious people, and the theme will be very rich. But the direction of "Sacrifice" is still partial to Japanese youth story, as a novel as the background of sports competitions, it is not bloody enough, as a mystery novel, and not enough to be original and catchy.
Road cycling is a type of indirect competition, it is not like football, wrestling and other sports where there are unexpected situations every minute, and the confrontation is more direct. From the beginning to the end, this relatively long cycling road is very challenging to write rhythmically, twists and turns, and to make the reader feel substitutionary.
Also depicting non-direct confrontation team sports, I recommend Miura Shien's "Strong Wind", the theme is the college student relay marathon, this book is a first-class work in terms of mood, writing, character group portraits, and youth aftermath, making people want to go out and run two laps after reading it.
Of course, "Strong Wind" is not a mystery novel.
Although they all depict sports, different writers have their own interests in the treatment of these works.
Agatha and Ailes use sports as the background of the story, so as to quickly explain the protagonist's personality, background, and economic situation; I don't know that Kyosuke Fire and Shie Kondo selected more niche sports that people are curious about in the common types of industry secrets of social reasoning, so as to radiate to more sports circles and unspoken rules in the workplace; When Keigo Higashino didn't have to prove his ability through his works, he chose to let go of himself and write love letters directly to the sport he really liked.
Of course, my favorite is Kotaro Isaka's handling of it, distilling the temperament of courage and fearlessness in sports, and combining the story of small people reversing the big crisis to write romantic and sincere novels. This approach reminds me of Hot Dog's "Second Half of the Ninth Game": "I put my hat back and was still expecting a reversal." Yes, all readers, expect not only a reversal at the story level, but also a reversal in life.
In addition to the above works, Yugo Aosaki's table tennis in "Gymnasium Mystery" and Shoji Shimada's baseball in "The Last Ball" are all good combinations of mystery fiction and sports.
What other sports-related mystery novels have you read, welcome to leave a message in the comment area!
Text/Lu Yehua
Editor/Miyako Li Yongbo
Proofreader/Wang Xin