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Shimabara Double SuicideAuthor: Kikuchi Kan
| Original Title | 島原心中 |
|---|---|
| Author | 菊池 寛 |
| Genre | Popular Fiction |
| Author Type | Male Author |
| Summary | A writer crafting a serial novel seeks legal expertise from an old friend, now a jaded prosecutor, to devise a plausible crime for his story—a nobleman ensnared by a ruthless social climber. Their collaboration drifts into darker territory as the prosecutor recounts a haunting case from his past: the investigation of a double suicide in Shimabara’s decaying pleasure quarter. Once a legendary district of opulent teahouses, Shimabara now lies in ruin, its crumbling brothels mirroring the desolation of their inhabitants. A young conscripted craftsman and an indentured prostitute, trapped by debt and despair, stage a botched suicide pact. As the prosecutor interrogates the surviving man, he unravels layers of exploitation and systemic cruelty, confronting his own complicity in a legal machine that punishes victims while their oppressors profit. The line between justice and moral hypocrisy blurs amid bloodstained tatami and the ghostly pallor of the dead—a stark portrait of society’s forgotten underbelly, where escape comes only through tragedy. |
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