The Prodigal Detective

Yunhai Fenghan

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Word count
451.5K words

Tags

Featured Fiction Mystery and Suspense Criminal InvestigationSuspenseMathematical ThinkingRevengePuzzle SolvingWeb Novel

Summary

Song Yang, a boy from a seaside town, is distantly related to Song Ci, the father of forensic medicine, and has been obsessed since childhood with mathematics and legends of buried treasure. After scoring full marks in mathematics on the college entrance exam, he enters the mathematics department of Jinling Normal University, falls in love at first sight with the Hui student Ma Xiaoman, and first reveals his detective talent by uncovering the privacy of a campus celebrity. After graduation he returns to a school environment such as Zhonglou No. 1 Middle School, meets veteran detective Guo and others, and becomes involved in a series of cases including a suicide scene, a celebrity disappearance, and a mystery at a medical examination center. Using mathematical thinking and reasoning, he investigates layer by layer, while driven by a desire for revenge, he gradually walks the path of a detective.

Editor's review

This book centers on a mathematical genius solving crimes, blending campus youth, urban crime, and serial mysteries. The case designs show some ingenuity, the protagonist's reasoning process is the main draw, and the romance thread also takes up considerable space. It suits readers who like light suspense with a mix of campus and urban flavors. The weaknesses are a slow early pace, a somewhat loose alternation between romance and deduction, and some descriptions that lean toward folksy humor; readers seeking hardcore fair-play mystery may find it unsatisfying.

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Reading tips

  1. Start with Volume One, Old Matters, to grasp the protagonist's personality and background setup
  2. In the case-solving sections, pay attention to the use of mathematical thinking rather than getting bogged down in details
  3. The romance and case threads advance alternately; read by volume to avoid skipping around

FAQ

Is this book complete? Search results show it has been updated through the final chapter of Volume Six, so it can basically be considered complete.
What kind of person is the protagonist? A university student from a mathematical-genius background who takes the path of investigation out of a desire for revenge.
Is it suitable for mystery beginners? Yes. The cases are moderately difficult and lean more toward urban suspense and emotional growth.

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About the author

Yunhai Fenghan Author

Yunhai Fenghan is a web novel author about whom very little public information is currently available: neither a clear nationality nor dates of birth and death have been confirmed, and no authoritative account of his personal background has been found. His only work in the database is The Vagabond Detective, a suspense and mystery novel that has also been listed under premium fiction, suggesting that his writing focuses on weaving case-based deduction together with the fates of his characters. Judging from the title, the work may center on an unconventional, unrestrained detective figure who moves outside ordinary rules, with the investigations revealing human warmth and coldness as well as the struggle between good and evil. In the absence of the author's own statements or outside commentary, Yunhai Fenghan's overall body of work remains difficult to assess; his style, narrative pacing, and prose quality can only be sensed from this single title. At present, he is best regarded as an author who has left a mark through one suspense novel, and his future writing remains to be seen.