Tezcatlipoca by Kiwamu Sato, translated by Stephen Paul (Yen On)

Tezcatlipoca was originally published in the Japanese language in 2021 by Kadokawa Corporation. It won the Naoki Prize, a prestigious Japanese literary award and was heralded as one of the best mysteries by a number of other publications. It was translated into English and published in February of 2023 by Yen On Books. 

It’s one of the most astonishing and disturbing novels you will ever read. It blends Aztec mythology and culture with a dose of the mystical and supernatural along with drug cartels, the Yakuza, organized crime syndicates, and illegal activities of the present. The story moves from the drug cartel war zones in Mexico to the bustling city of Jakarta and ends up in the Kanto area of Japan. 

In order to truly understand the story, it may help to study up on the gods of Aztec culture. Tezcatlipoca is the God of Providence and is considered one of the four sons of  Ometecuhtli and Omecihuatl, two major deities known as the “Dual Gods”. The name Tezcatlipoca is usually translated as “smoking mirror” from Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs. The festival celebrating Tezcatlipoca is called Toxcatl and involves a human sacrifice.

The story centers are three very different individuals—a Mexican drug lord on the run whose empire is taken over by another cartel, a neglected child who grows up to commit a terrible crime and is locked away for an extended period of time, and a Japanese heart surgeon who loses his license and becomes an illegal organ broker. 

Koshimo, the child of a Mexican mother and Yakuza father, grows into a big strong teenager and when he finds his drunken father beating his mother, he easily overpowers him and breaks his neck with his bare hands. His mother is having a flashback of her brother being killed by a narco so she attacks her protector. Koshimo hits her with one hard slap and she’s dead. He casually walks down the stairs to the first-floor hardware store and asks the owner to call the police. Koshimo is only thirteen. 

In September 2015, a newspaper article reports that the latest drug war is reaching its final stage after two years of fighting. As is true of the hometown of Koshimo’s mother, Sinaloa is now the battleground between old Los Casasola and the Dogo Cartel, who will replace them. “The amount of cocaine that crosses the border won’t change. And neither will the United States’ status as the biggest market place”. 

Valmira Casasola is the only surviving member of Los Casasolas, after they’ve been ousted by the Dogo Cartel, and Valmira is fleeing for his life. However, he plans to start from scratch to build a new empire and vows to take down the Dogo Cartel. He’s been in on the run for quite a while and ends up in Indonesia working at a food cart that sells cobra satay. 

After their Catholic father died, Valmero and his three brothers were indoctrinated into the belief of their abuela, Libertad, who was a firm believer in all of the Aztec gods. As an adult, Valmiro also becomes more enamored with his indigenous heritage. His food cart in the market is just a cover for selling illicit drugs on the side so he can make contacts to build his empire. It’s here that he meets a Japanese man who calls himself Tanaka. 

Tanaka, or Suenaga as we find out later, is an organ broker for a Chinese gang and a militant Islamic organization. However, his main desire is to go back to the operating room in a clean environment. He doesn’t want to be just any back-alley doctor. He believes his skills could be used in a more productive way.

The two men, former drug kingpin and disgraced heart surgeon, form a plan to corner the market on illegal heart transplants. They present their plan to the Chinese gang and to an officer of the militant group and a nefarious web of evil is about to be loosed upon the world. What evil will befall the world? Only the God Tezcatlipoca might know the answer. ~Ernie Hoyt