A Night Without a Culprit
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Summary
A pioneering work of Keigo Higashino's signature "realistic orthodox" style, laying the foundation for his profound reflections on human nature!
A Slight Malice—Envy
A high school friend's seemingly accidental death turns out to stem from a prank born of a naive crush?
The True Culprit Hides in the Night—Wrath
A high school student's younger brother is killed at home, and the traces at the scene reveal that the true culprit is hiding within the household!
The Dancing Girl—Pride
A secret crush and confession that the other party knew nothing about somehow led to her "disappearance"?
Endless Night—Greed
A husband is murdered. Why does the wife tell the police that it was this city that killed him?
White Weapon—Sloth
A series of murders in the workplace turns out to have been caused by everyone's negligence and shirking of responsibility.
Goodbye, Coach—Lust
After watching the victim's video, the police become even more convinced that this is a crime that can only be called "perfect"...
The Night Without a Culprit—Silence
After an accidental death, everyone at the scene is manipulated by the murderer into busily destroying all the evidence...
Interwoven desires and bizarre crimes... the breakthrough work of Keigo Higashino's writing career!
Editor's review
In terms of content, the book continues the social-school underpinnings typical of Higashino's work, embedding the puzzle deeply within complex human relationships and the predicaments of contemporary life. The story revolves around a bizarre event that appears to have "no culprit," and its brilliance lies not in sensational depictions of blood and violence but in a calm dissection of the gray areas of human nature and the blurred boundaries of morality. Pan Yuling's prose is fluent and cinematic; while maintaining Higashino's cool rhythm, it incorporates emotional details closer to local readers, making the characters more flesh-and-blood.
The value of this book lies not only in its progressive and logically sound deductions and reversals but also in the profound question it raises: when the causal chain of a crime is stretched infinitely and responsibility is极度 diluted, who is the real "culprit"? It explores the tension among collective unconsciousness, structural social pressure, and individual choice, showing strong real-world concern. Readers familiar with Keigo Higashino can appreciate the ingenious transplantation of his core concept; for new readers, this is also a highly accomplished and thought-provoking work of high-quality social-school mystery. Its Douban rating has remained around 8.0, confirming readers' recognition of its quality.
Who it's for
A good fit for
- Readers who enjoy social-school mystery and care about the human nature and society behind cases
- Keigo Higashino fans who want to explore how his stories are presented in different creative contexts
- Literature enthusiasts interested in Sino-Japanese cultural fusion and cross-model creative experiments
- Mystery readers who prefer tightly plotted stories with reasonable reversals rather than mere sensory stimulation
Not a good fit for
- Hardcore mystery fans seeking pure intellectual puzzle-solving pleasure such as orthodox locked-room tricks
- Readers who cannot accept work not fully created by a single author and who are skeptical of collaborative models
Reading tips
- It is recommended to set aside fixed expectations of a "Keigo Higashino work" and read it as an independent creative experiment
- Focus on the transformation of character motives and the shaping of individuals by the social environment—this is key to understanding the book's core
- After finishing the ending, review the many details in the earlier text; you will find the author's foreshadowing remarkably ingenious
About the publisher
Hunan Literature and Art Publishing House is a publisher known for its literary titles, with a catalogue spanning foreign literature, world classics, classical Chinese literature, essays and miscellaneous writings, and mystery and detective fiction. Judging from the more than 1,100 books in the database, the press publishes foreign classics such as Crime and Punishment, Snow Country, The Complete Sherlock Holmes and Letter from an Unknown Woman, as well as Chinese classical and modern literary works including Lu Xun's Wandering and A Madman's Diary and Wu Jingzi's The Scholars. In terms of translators and authors, translations by Cao Guowei and Tan Jinghua appear in its foreign literature titles, and the authors involved include Dostoevsky, Kawabata Yasunari, Conan Doyle and Zweig. Its publishing character lies in introducing Chinese and foreign literary classics side by side, balancing popular and serious works and attending to both readability and literary value. Public information is limited; the above is a brief overview based solely on the books in the database.
Contents
- 版权信息
- 轻微的蓄意
- 真凶匿于黑夜
- 跳舞的女孩
- 无尽之夜
- 白色凶器
- 再见，教练
- 无凶之夜
- 译后记
FAQ
Was this book written by Keigo Higashino himself?
Is the story set in Japan or China?
Does the mystery style lean toward orthodox or social school?
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About the author
Keigo Higashino was a Japanese mystery novelist, born on February 4, 1958, in Ikuno Ward, Osaka, and a graduate of Osaka Prefecture University. He made his debut in 1985 with After School, which won the Edogawa Rampo Prize. He went on to write prolifically, spanning honkaku mystery, socially engaged suspense, and warm-hearted narrative, with representative works including Journey Under the Midnight Sun, The Devotion of Suspect X, and Miracles of the Namiya General Store. In 2006 he received the Naoki Prize. His novels often wrap intricate deduction around human conflict, featuring frequent plot twists and unexpected endings, and have had a wide influence on Chinese-language readers. This site carries 24 of his works, mostly catalogued under foreign literature, classic works, and mystery and suspense. He died on July 23, 2026.
Pan Yuling is an active translator of foreign literature in the Chinese publishing world. Public information about her is limited, and her nationality, dates of birth and death, and educational background are not clearly recorded. Judging from the eleven works held in the collection, her translation interests center on Japanese literature, especially mystery and supernatural tales. Her representative translations include the eight-volume Collected Works of Keigo Higashino, the short story collection The Maid's Strange Tales marking Eichi's 25th anniversary, and fully illustrated ukiyo-e editions of Chinese Ghost Stories and Japanese Folk Tales. She has also translated works such as You Who Welcome Your Ninth Eighteen and Finally Seeing Myself, with subjects ranging from inspirational growth to world history. Her translations balance readability with fidelity to the source text, and her selections concentrate on Japanese mystery and ghost-story literature, offering Chinese readers reliable versions of these works.
