The Miracles of the Namiya General Store

By Higashino Kiego 

Translated by Sam Bett

(2012, translated 2019)

Yen On

(Novel) 

Higashino Keigo is best known for his internationally popular series of mystery novels about Detective Galileo or Detective Kaga. The Miracles of the Namiya General Store is a stand-alone fantasy that is very much a light and warm novel that seems very different from Keigo’s other work, yet there is a mystery, a complex interlocking set of relationships, long rumination on the topic of motive, and even a “scene of the crime” to which characters keep returning. The story begins with a bungled robbery of the shuttered Namiya General Store. The shop turns out to hold nothing worth stealing, but exiting the building proves to be a problem: the issue is that time behaves differently inside the shop than it does in “the real world.” As the criminals struggle to understand the nature of their temporary prison, a letter drops through the mail slot. The curious criminals read the enclosed note, in which a young person describes a love affair and asks for advice on how to proceed. The men discuss the situation of the writer and argue about the pros and cons of their options. Should she or shouldn’t she? Deciding that the romantic needs to be shaken out of her fantasy, they decide to take the path of “tough love;” they advise the writer to accept reality and follow their blunt command. The next morning, they discover they can exit the shop freely and leave, somewhat changed by their experience but empty-handed. So begins a series of stories involving time travel, fate, and the topic of advice: for the love-lorn, for those trying to choose between careers, for those paralyzed by indecision. As the novel progresses, Higashino reveals more about the shop’s mysterious origins and how it served and continues to serve a certain community. He also allows the reader to see more letters from petitioners seeking guidance, the responses they receive, and best of all, the way the petitioners choose (or do not choose) to act on that advice, all leading to complex but often deeply satisfying outcomes. For the patient and careful reader, The Miracles of the Namiya General Store offers many mysteries, interesting characters, and thought-provoking ruminations on our very human need to reveal our secrets to a trusted friend or professional relationship expert and ask for advice on how we should proceed. Hiroki Ryuichi directed a film version of The Miracles of the Namiya General Store; it was released in 2017.  

“This was a development he hadn’t been expecting when he boarded the train at Tokyo Station. He’d been prepared to be chided by his parents and guilted by his relatives, but not for his parents to shield him from their accusations. He thought back to the moment three years prior when he watched his parents limp away from his apartment, the night they failed to persuade him. How had they come to this change of heart?” (66)