Pushkin Vertigo to Publish Japanese Crime Phenomenon: Strange Pictures

 

Pushkin Vertigo, an imprint of Pushkin Press, is to publish Strange Pictures, the first novel by Uketsu, a masked Japanese Youtuber turned bestselling novelist. Pushkin Senior Commissioning Editor Daniel Seton bought World English Rights in this and a second title from Kenny Okuyama at Japan Uni Agency. Strange Pictures will be published, in a translation by Jim Rion, in trade paperback and eBook on 16^th January 2025.

 

Published in Japan by Futabasha in autumn 2022, Strange Pictures has already sold 800,000 copies, making Uketsu one of the most talked-about young crime writers in the country. Two further novels by the author have been published by Asukashinsha, with total sales for the books now approaching 3 million copies.

 

Emily Books Agency and Casanovas & Lynch coordinated the sale in Europe during and after the London Book Fair and received over 50 offers from 20 different countries, a record for Futabasha’s 76 years of history. Foreign rights have now been sold in 29 territories and film/tv requests have been pouring in. In the United States Ruth Logan sold rights on behalf of Pushkin Press to HarperVia in a highly competitive auction. They will also publish Strange Pictures in January 2025.

 

Strange Pictures is an intriguing new style of crime novel, in which the reader is encouraged to play detective and solve the mystery behind a series of unsettling drawings. On a seemingly innocuous blog, a pregnant woman’s sketches conceal a chilling warning; a child's picture of his home contains within it a dark secret message; a sketch made by a murder victim in his final moments leads an amateur sleuth into an investigation that will reveal a terrifying reality...

 

The book will be launched with an innovative and ambitious marketing and publicity campaign. An exclusive run of early proofs are currently landing with select readers, with a wider proof run planned for the autumn. Further activity will be largely video based, to closely align with Uketsu’s own creative and unique content.

 

Daniel Seton said: ‘I’m delighted to have acquired this highly innovative and brilliantly creepy mystery. It feels like an exciting new kind of crime writing, involving the reader in solving the puzzle in a way few authors have done before. It has already been a sensation in Japan and I think it will soon be one all over the world.’

 

Translator Jim Rion said: ‘As a genuine fan, I can't wait to share Uketsu's crafty tales of the macabre with readers around the world’

 

Uketsu is an enigmatic Youtuber and author, specializing in horror and mystery. He always appears in videos wearing a white mask and black body stocking, with his voice digitally distorted. His true identity is unknown. Strange Pictures was Uketsu’s debut novel.

Forthcoming Books from Pushkin Press.

 

February 2024

Harlequin Butterfly is by Toh Enjoe. Successful entrepreneur A.A. Abrams is pursuing the enigmatic writer Tomoyuki Tomoyuki, who appears to have the ability to write expertly in the language of any place they go. Abrams sinks endless resources into finding the writer, but Tomoyuki Tomoyuki always manages to stay one step ahead, taking off moments before being pinned down. But how does the elusive author move from one place to the next, from one language to the next? Ingenious and dazzling, Harlequin Butterfly unfurls one puzzle after another, taking us on a mind-bending journey into the imagination.

The Trials of Lila Dalton is by L J Shepherd. 'I look up to find twelve strangers staring back at me... I realise I'm the one they're waiting for.' Lila Dalton has no memory of how she got to this courtroom. The man in the docks is accused of mass murder, and she's his barrister - but she can't remember anything about the case. She can't remember anything at all. Lila is stranded on an island hundreds of miles from the UK, where the most serious crimes go to trial. The next plane out doesn't leave for days. And she's being watched. Someone keeps breaking into her hotel room to leave cryptic notes, threatening her with deadly consequences if she doesn't get her client off... Can Lila Dalton win her case and solve the mystery of her own identity?

March 2024

'We all have our secrets...' Renowned therapist Clarissa Virtanen is not afraid to look at the darkest side of humanity. Haunted by the death of a young patient, she will do whatever it takes to save the most vulnerable. But when Ida - angry, damaged and seemingly suicidal - walks into her office, Clarissa may have met her match. For Ida has secrets. Murderous secrets, which mark her like a bloodstain. Secrets which drive her to kill. And kill again. Somehow, Clarissa must find the key to unlock her past. So she makes a bargain with Ida - six months to try and stop her taking her own life. But what if she has entered a game more deadly, and more evil, than she could ever imagine? Follow The Butterfly is by Marta Kaukonen.

April 2024

Blessed Water is by Margot Douahy. Tattooed from her neck to her toes and sporting a gold tooth as sharp as her wisecracks, Sister Holiday struggles to stay on the righteous path. She's committed both to taking her permanent vows with the Sisters of the Sublime Blood and joining Magnolia Riveaux's latest venture, Redemption Detective Agency-both in service of satisfying her eternal quest for answers. When Sister Holiday and Riveaux set out to bust a philandering husband, they instead find the body of a priest floating in the Mississippi river, and with it, Redemption's next case.  As a torrential rainstorm drowns New Orleans for three harrowing days over Easter weekend, Sister Holiday and Riveaux follow the clues. With the stakes rising alongside the relentless floodwaters, our favourite punk nun-sleuth throws herself into the deep end yet again.

Strange things are happening in the Chizurui mansion... At night, a figure clad in a Hannya mask is spotted wandering around the house. The amateur crime fiction writer, Akimitsu Takagi, is sent to investigate, but then tragedy strikes. The head of the Chizurui family is found dead inside his study, locked from the inside, with only a Hannya mask and the scent of jasmine as clues to his mysterious death. As Takagi delves deeper into the case, can he discover the link between the family and the curse of the Hannya mask? Who was the person who called the undertaker and asked for three coffins? And how many buried secrets lie behind the inexplicable murder? The Noh Mask Murder is by Akimitsu Takagi a gripping masterpiece of a locked-room mystery written by one of Japan's most celebrated crime writer.

May 2024

The Mystery of The Crooked Man is by Tom Spencer. Meet Agatha Dorn, cantankerous archivist, grammar pedant, gin afficionado and murder mystery addict. When she discovers a lost manuscript by Gladden Green, the Empress of Golden Age detective fiction, Agatha's life takes an unexpected twist. She becomes an overnight sensation, basking in the limelight of literary stardom. But Agatha's newfound fame takes a nosedive when the 'rediscovered' novel is exposed as a hoax. And when her ex-lover turns up dead, with a scrap of the manuscript by her side, Agatha suspects foul play. Cancelled, ostracised and severely ticked off, Agatha turns detective to uncover the sinister truth that connects the murder and the fraudulent manuscript. But can she stay sober long enough to catch the murderer, or will Agatha become a whodunit herself?

The Little Sparrow Murders is by Seishi Yokomizo. An old friend of Kosuke Kindaichi's invites the scruffy detective to visit the remote mountain village of Onikobe in order to look into a twenty-year-old murder case. But no sooner has Kindaichi arrived than a new series of murders strikes the village - several bodies are discovered staged in bizarre poses, and it soon becomes clear that the victims are being killed using methods that match the lyrics of an old local children's song... The legendary sleuth investigates, but soon realises that he must unravel the dark and tangled history of the village, as well as that of its rival families, to get to the truth.

Books to Look Forward to From Pushkin Press

 

January 2022

Detective Kosuke Kindaichi arrives on the remote Gokumon Island bearing tragic news–the son of one of the island’s most important families has died, on a troop transport ship bringing him back home after the Second World War. But Kindaichi has not come merely as a messenger–with his last words, the dying man warned that his three step-sisters’ lives would now be in danger. The scruffy detective is determined to get to the bottom of this mysterious prophesy, and to protect the three women if he can. As Kindaichi attempts to unravel the island’s secrets, a series of gruesome murders begins. He investigates, but soon finds himself in mortal danger from both the unknown killer and the clannish locals, who resent this outsider meddling in their affairs. Gokumon Island is by Seishi Yokomizo.

All Was Lost is by Steven Maxwell. The cash is gone. The hunt is on. How far would you go for your family? Orla McCabe has found a case of money. Willing to do almost anything to give her family a better life, she flees with her husband and baby daughter - and the money. Meanwhile, detectives Lynch and Carlin are investigating a botched human trafficking deal on the isolated northern moors. They find piles of bullet-riddled bodies, but no cash. The owners of the money are on the hunt, and soon a world of brutal violence envelops Orla and the detectives. To secure her daughter's future, Orla will never stop running. It's just a matter of who she drags into the dark with her. . .

April 2022

Caleb's addict brother, Anton, has been missing for months, still angry about Caleb's part in his downfall. After almost giving up hope of finding him, Caleb receives an anonymous message alerting him to Ant's whereabouts and warning him that Ant is in danger. A man has been shot and Ant might be next. Caleb reluctantly leaves his pregnant wife's side and tracks his brother to an isolated island where Ant has been seeking treatment. There, he finds a secretive community under threat from a sniper, and a cult-like doctor with a troubling background. Caleb must hunt for the sniper to save Ant, but any misstep may ruin their faltering reconciliation, and end in death. When body parts begin to wash up on shore, it looks like the sniper is growing more desperate... Those who Perish is by Emma Viskic.

June 2022

London in Black is by Jack Lutz. London 2027, terrorists deploy a highy sophistcated nerve agent called London Black at Waterloo station – for an unfortunate section of the population, what follows is agonising physical deterioration and usually death. London 2029, Dr Lucy Stone is called to investigate the gruesome murder of the scientist who developed an antidote to the nerve agent. It is a daily boost making life bearable for the 'Vulnerable' – but isn't a cure. Lucy suspects the scientist might have been working on a permanently end the bane of London Black for herself and the other Vulnerables. But is the antitdote real or a figment of Lucy's desperation. 

Books to Look Forward to from Pushkin Press and Pushkin Vertigo

August 2020

Annibale Canessa didn't want to go back to his old life. When everything went wrong in 1984, he traded his brutal, exciting career in the Carabinieri for paradise in San Fruttuoso. He started swimming in the bay at dawn and helping his elderly aunt run a small restaurant. His life was calm. But some shattering news pulls him back in - his estranged brother has been found dead; lying beside him, the body of an ex-terrorist, a man Canessa himself caught. Back in Milan, Canessa must pursue old connections and unsolved crimes, which draw him ever deeper into the underworld he thought he'd left behind.  The Second Life of Inspector Canessa is by Roberto Perrone.

Gwendolyn and Estella are as close as sisters can be. But now Gwendolyn is lying in a coma, the sole survivor after Estella poisons their entire family. As Gwendolyn struggles to regain consciousness, she desperately retraces her memories, trying to uncover the moment that led to such a brutal act. Journeying from the luxurious world of Indonesia's rich and powerful, to the spectacular shows of Paris Fashion Week, and the melting pot of Melbourne's student scene, The Majesties is a haunting novel about the dark secrets that can build a family empire - and also bring it crashing down.  The Majesties is by Tiffany Tsao.

September 2020

The members of a university mystery club decide to visit an island which was the site of a grisly, unsolved multiple murder the year before.  They’re looking forward to investigating the crime, putting their passion for solving mysteries to practical use. , but before long there is a fresh murder. , and soon the club-members realise they are being picked up one by one.  The remaining amateur sleuths will have to use all their murder mystery expertise  to find the killer before they end up dead too.  The Decagon House Murders by Yukito Ayatsuji is a playful, loving and fiendishly plotted homage to the best of golden age crime.  

October 2020

Three-Fifths by John Vercher is about a biracial black man, passing for white, who is forced to confront the lies of his past while facing the truth of his present when his best friend, just released from prison, involves him in a hate crime. Pittsburgh, 1995. The son of a black father he's never known, and a white mother he sometimes wishes he didn't, twenty-two year-old Bobby Saraceno has passed for white his entire life. Raised by his bigoted maternal grandfather, Bobby has hidden the truth about his identity from everyone, even his best friend and fellow comic-book geek, Aaron, who has just returned home from prison a newly radicalized white supremacist. Bobby's disparate worlds crash when, during the night of their reunion, Bobby witnesses Aaron mercilessly assault a young black man with a brick. Fearing for his safety and his freedom, Bobby must keep the secret of his mixed race from Aaron and conceal his unwitting involvement in the crime from the police. But Bobby's delicate house of cards crumbles when his father enters his life after more than twenty years, forcing his past to collide with his present.

November 2020

The Darkroom of Damocles is by Willem Frederik Hermans.   During the German occupation of Holland, tobacconist Henri Osewoudt is visited by Dorbeck. Dorbeck is Osewoudt's spitting image in reverse. Henri is blond and beardless, with a high voice; Dorbeck is dark-haired, and his voice deep. 'I had the feeling I was an extension of him, or even part of him. When I first set eyes on him I thought: this is the sort of man I should have been.'   Dorbeck gives Osewoudt a series of dangerous assignments: helping British agents and eliminating traitors. But the assassinations get out of hand, and when Osewoudt discovers that his wife denounced him to the Germans, he kills her too.  Having survived all the dangers, at the end of the war Osewoudt is himself taken for a traitor and captured. He cannot prove that he received his assignments from Dorbeck. Worse, he cannot prove that Dorbeck ever existed. When he develops a roll of film that should show a photograph of the two of them together, the picture is a dud. He flees from prison in panic and is dishonourably shot on the run.

Books to Look Forward to From Pushkin Press (Vertigo)

February 2020

In 1940s Japan, the wealthy head of the Inugami Clan dies, and his family eagerly await the reading of the will. But no sooner are its strange details revealed than a series of bizarre, gruesome murders begins. Detective Kindaichi must unravel the clan's terrible secrets of forbidden liaisons, monstrous cruelty, and hidden identities to find the murderer, and lift the curse wreaking its bloody revenge on the Inugamis. The Inugami Curse is by Seishi Yokomizo and is a fiendish, intricately plotted classic mystery from a giant of Japanese crime writing, starring the legendary detective Kosuke Kindaichi.

March 2020

Darkness for Light is by Emma Viskic.  After a lifetime of bad decisions PI Caleb Zelic is finally making some good ones. He's in therapy, his business is recovering and his relationship with his estranged wife Kat is on the mend. But soon Caleb is drawn into the tangled life of his troubled ex partner Frankie, which leads to a confrontation with the cops. And when Frankie's niece is kidnapped, she and Caleb must work together to save the child's life. But can Caleb trust her after her past betrayals?

May 2020

In the small town of Crozon, Brittany, a library houses the faded dreams of aspiring writers – manuscripts that were rejected for publication. Visiting while on holiday, successful young editor Delphine Despero is thrilled to discover a novel so powerful she feels compelled to bring the manuscript back to Paris to have it published.   The book is a sensation, prompting fevered interest in the identity of its author – appar- ently one Henri Pick, a now-deceased pizza chef from Crozon. Sceptics begin to cry that the whole thing is a hoax. How could this man have written such a masterpiece? Jean-Michel Rouche, an obstinate journalist, heads to Crozon to investigate. The Mystery of Henri Pick is by David Foenkinos 

CWA announce shortlist for Best Crime Publisher

Shortlist Announced for New CWA Dagger Best Crime & Mystery Publisher

The shortlist has been announced for the inaugural CWA Dagger for the Best Crime and Mystery Publisher of the Year. The award is the first new Dagger category created in over a decade.

The Crime Writers’ Association (CWA) Daggers are regarded by the publishing world as the foremost British awards in crime writing, established in 1955.

Shortlist 2019

Faber & Faber

Harper Fiction (HarperCollins)

HQ (HarperCollins)

No Exit Press (Oldcastle Books)

Orenda Books

Pushkin Vertigo (Pushkin)

Raven (Bloomsbury)

Maxim Jakubowski, Honorary Vice-Chair of the CWA, said: “We’re delighted with the high quality nominees for this new Dagger, a category we felt was overdue in our award portfolio. Publishers play a vital role in driving the biggest selling genre and shaping our cultural landscape. The publicists, editors, designers and hard-working teams that support new and existing authors deserve this recognition.”

The shortlisted publishers and imprints were nominated by a representative group of leading book reviewers, booksellers, festival organisers, bloggers, literary agents and journalists.

The nominee criteria was the display of excellence and diversity in publishing. Factors taken into account include developing new authors and marketing and promoting crime fiction.

The winner will be announced at the prestigious Dagger Awards Dinner on October 24 at the Leonardo Royal Hotel London City (formerly known as Grange City) on Cooper’s Row, London.

For ticket details and to book a place, https://thecwa.co.uk/the-daggers/cwa-dagger-awards-gala-dinner-2019 or contact admin@thecwa.co.uk Discounts are available for tables of 10 or 12.