FROM ONE OF JAPAN'S GREATEST CRIME WRITERS—THE AUTHOR OF THE HONJIN MURDERS: Nothing at The Black Cat Café is as it seems . . .

In order to solve this sensational stand-alone murder mystery, scruffy detective Kosuke Kindaichi will have to untangle a complex web of love, jealousy, and betrayal.

In post-war Tokyo, still recovering from the devastating wartime bombing raids, a patrolling policeman passing The Black Cat Café makes a gruesome discovery: the body of a woman, lying in a hastily dug hole, with a dead black cat by her side. The woman's face is disfigured beyond recognition, and the café's black cat seems alive and well, so where did the two corpses come from, and why were they buried in the café's garden?

As the legendary scruffy sleuth Kosuke Kindaichi investigates, he realizes the café's enigmatic madam, Oshima, has a past shrouded in secrecy, and what exactly is her relationship with the owner, Itoshima?