Samurai Shenanigans

A retired swordsman, his son, and a swordswoman unravel plots and solve crimes
in feudal Japan


Lately, you may have encountered and tried to look up the provenance of a translated novel called "Samurai Tanteidan" by award-winning Japanese author Shotaro Ikenami. If you couldn't, it's because the original title is Kenkaku Shobai ("Swordsman Business"), which was serialised in the monthly magazine Shosetsu Shincho between 1972 and 1989 and is one of many historical novels by Ikenami.

This modern translation is titled The Samurai Detectives and, like the original, follows a father and son as they navigate the way of the sword during the Tokugawa shogunate, though it's the son who does more navigating than the dad who, when the story begins, has ostensibly laid down arms to live a life of leisure.


Read the rest of this review here.

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The Samurai Detectives (Vol. 1)

Shotaro Ikenami (translated by Yui Kajita)
Penguin UK
272 pages
Fiction
ISBN: 9781405975766