First Love

By Shimamoto Rio

Translated by Louise Heal Kawai

(2018, translated 2024)

Honford Star

First Love is a legal and psychological thriller. A young woman, dazed, her clothes bloodstained, surrenders herself at a Tokyo police station. She declares that she has just killed her father in a women’s bathroom in a nearby university. Affectless, just 22 years old, Kanna Hijiriyama asks the arresting officers–and by extension, contemporary Tokyo–not for mercy, but for a rationale for the crime she committed.  She is assigned a defense lawyer, Kasho Anno, who, desperate to save the young woman from the death penalty, contacts his sister-in-law, Dr. Yuki Makabe, a driven and highly competitive psychologist who runs a respected practice, appears regularly on television as an expert, and is currently contracted to write a psychological study on a famous case aimed toward a popular audience. Dr. Makabe agrees to work with Kanna while Anno handles the legal aspects of the defense. In Kanna, Dr. Makabe discovers a young woman slowly emerging from a fugue-like state to affirm that she attended an audition to work as an anchorperson at a local news company, left early, purchased a knife, and killed her father. She repeats that she does not know why she did so, and although that claim is patently bizarre, it becomes more believable as Dr. Makabe unspools the mysteries of Kanna’s upbringing and the romantic entanglements of her youth. Physically and emotionally, Kanna can only manage short sessions with Dr. Makabe, but she appears sincere in her desire to fight for her life. To further complicate matters, Kanno regularly reminds her doctor that she is a compulsive liar. As Dr. Makabe comes closer to understanding her patient, she comes to grips with her own suppressed secrets and lies that she has been suppressing or running from for years. First Love is a fast read that gives us a glimpse of the Japanese judicial system and a patriarchal society that merely winks at violations of laws protecting women and the peccadillos of powerful men.

“I’ve heard that being a clinical psychologist isn’t a valid qualification. You’re not like psychiatrists who have to graduate from medical school. I can’t see how some random, unqualified person could understand anything about human nature.” 

“The differences in individual skills are certainly an issue within the industry as a whole,” I responded calmly. “However, our clinic director has ample experience as a psychiatrist engaged in clinical work. In that sense, he is completely qualified.” “Even if your director is impressive, how can you, such a young person, do anything for Kanna? Do you really think you can fix a girl who grew up just fine until she killed her father over a disagreement about her choice of career? If so, then you clearly don’t know a thing about raising children or human nature.” 

“My role isn’t to try to fix Kanna, but to look into and help her sort out her past. By the way, there’s something I’d like to ask you. Have you seen the scars on Kanna’s arms?” “Of course. What about it?” she replied, impassive.”