Six Four by Hideo Yokoyama (Riverrun)

This is Hideo Yokoyama’s first book to be published in English. Fourteen years ago in the first week of the sixty-fourth year of the Showa Era or 1989, Prefecture D was in the midst of an investigation involving a large number of police officers. A seven year old girl named Shoko Amamiya was kidnapped and held for a twenty-million yen ransom. The case ended on a sour note as the police found the girl’s dead body five days after the perpetrator escaped with the money. He remains at large and his identity remains unknown. The unsolved case has been given the name Six Four. 

Yoshinobu Mikami has recently been assigned the position of Press Director in Media Relations, a branch of Administrative Affairs, after having served in the Criminal Investigation’s First Division in Nonviolent Crime. He also worked on the kidnapping investigation fourteen years ago. He was a member of the Close Pursuit Unit and had followed the victim’s father, Yoshio Amimiya, to the ransom exchange point. He has been summoned by Akama, the Director of Administrative Affairs and Ishii, the Secretariat Chief to their office. They inform him that the Commissioner General is going to pay them a visit the following week. 

The Commissioner General is the head of the National Police Agency (NPA) which is based in Tokyo. He is responsible for some 260,000 police officers. “To the regional police, he is like the emperor.” The plan is for the Commissioner General to visit the site where the body was found. He will make an offering of incense and flowers, then visit the father at his home to pay his respects. “To make an appeal inside and outside the force, and to give a boost to the officers still investigating the case. To reinforce our intention never to let violent crime go unpunished.” The timing is well-planned as the statute of limitations will go into effect in just a little over a year. Mikami realizes there is more to the Commissioner General’s visit when Akama says, “I do believe his appeal is intended more to reach an internal audience than the general public.” 

Mikami is assigned the task of getting permission from Amamiya for the Commissioner General’s visit. The first time Mikami goes to see Amamiya, his request is flatly refused but persuades Amamiya to change his mind on a subsequent visit. However, on the eve of the Commissioner’s visit, another kidnapping has taken place. The victim is a young girl and the kidnapper has demanded a twenty-million yen ransom. He has also given the victim’s father the same instructions as those given in the Six Four case. It becomes a race against time as the police have to determine if this is a copycat case or if it is the same person who committed the crime fourteen years ago. 

This is an exciting look into the inner workings of the Japanese police investigating process and the relationship between separate divisions within the force. It also sheds light on the politics and bureaucracy of the National Police Agency. It is also a high-paced mystery with an unpredictable outcome and will appeal to fans of Miyuki Miyabe and Keigo Higashino. Once I started reading, I could not put it down. ~Ernie Hoyt