I have been on an East Asian crime/mystery thriller kick lately, and I’ve got about three dozen excellent Japanese crime thrillers on my TBR. And that’s after already polishing off a good dozen or so. There are many crime and mystery authors like Hideo Yokoyama, Heigo Higashino, Sheicho Mastumoto, Akimitsu Takagi, Seishi Yokomizo, Soji Sjimada, Akimitsu Takagi, Yukito Ayatsuji, Riku Onda, Masako Togawa, etc. and each of these authors have multiple books.
In contrast, I have only found a handful of good crime mystery fiction from South Korea and China:
The Good Son and Seven Years of Darkness by You Jeong Jeong (Korea)
The Bad Kids and The Untouched Crime by Zijin Chen (China).
The Inspector Chen series by Qiu Xiaolong (China).
Most of the results I get when I search “crime thriller” or “murder mystery” are decidedly NOT that. The Hole, Plotters, Please Look After Mom, The Vegetarian, The Old Woman with the Knife etc. are not crime/mystery thrillers in the classical sense. Plotters especially, is like trippy ride through an alternate world of assassins and what not, not quite fantasy but definitely surreal, and not like “gritty detective and clever murderer.”
I understand that for Chinese fiction, some of it at least must come down to politics and censorship. But even with that in mind, there is still a huge gap in availability between the different countries. Are the genres not as popular? Is there a lack of translation into English?
by WeddingElly
1 Comment
>I understand that for Chinese fiction, some of it at least must come down to politics and censorship. But even with that in mind, there is still a huge gap in availability between the different countries. Are the genres not as popular? Is there a lack of translation into English?
i think it is less censorship and more US/western audience not wanting to read a book that is not critical of China/Chinese government. translation is a big expense and if you are not certain the book will be popular then there is no reason to attempt a translation.
there is a North Korean thriller i want to get my hands on, which has not been translated, about a hijacking of a civilian flight and a government worker saving the day. i cannot imagine a book praising North Korea’s government worker being popular in US/Europe.