Japanese Literary Awards

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Suntory Mystery Award さんとりーみすてりーたいしょう

Edition 15 (1998)

MysteryNew writer award

Winners

3 people
Goro Yuki ゆうき ごろう grand prize

People connected to a medical error twenty years earlier begin dying under mysterious circumstances. After a hospital director receives a letter threatening to expose the old incident, he too dies suddenly of ventricular fibrillation, linking the past negligence to the present deaths.

A threatening letter exposing a medical error from twenty years ago brings an old nightmare into the present.

278 pages
Medical negligenceHospitalsThreatening lettersPast guiltA series of deaths
Shiro Shijo しじょう しろう readers prize

Left-handed illustrator Toshiharu Toriyama comes home to find his wife dead in an unlit room. A phone call in her voice follows, and he realizes that his life and memories are gradually changing. Amid an inexplicable crisis involving genetic engineering and viruses, Toriyama searches for who he really is.

A year ago, someone cast a spell on my life.

295 pages
Altered memoriesGenetic engineeringVirusesIdentityFlight
Hirito Kawabata かわばた ひろと excellent work award

Natsu no Rocket is a coming-of-age novel about five young people who cannot let go of a dream from their high-school days and begin building a rocket on a deserted island. As they try to launch it beyond the atmosphere, the police take notice of their unauthorized project.

Five young people on a deserted island try to launch a real rocket into space, pursuing their dream at the boundary between aspiration and reality.

339 pages
coming of agerocket buildingdeserted islandsciencefriendship