Bardium is a tightly guarded city where magic, miracles, and illusions aren’t allowed. Here, in a dimly lit room, a young boy named Norman is being interrogated. He’s asked about Unlaw—supernatural monsters who gain abilities from unstable emotion. Four of these beings, all beautiful women, are now hunting each other down, and Norman must sate their desires while dealing with other oddities cropping up all over Bardium. The city is in chaos, and yet, there is hope. Everything will come dow...

EVERYBODY, PARTNER UP!A month after the Jim Adamworth incident, Norman and his four Unlaw settle into their new lives at the Elementary Detective Agency. However, just because life at home is peaceful doesn’t mean the city of Bardium has gotten any less chaotic. Lonsday and Eltiel team up to take down the Mad Bomber, and along the way, discover the existence of anti-Unlaw weapons. Meanwhile, Clareth and Shizuku head to Evergrace Academy to investigate the mystery of the murderous Banshee. ...

Two infamous Unlaw have escaped the capital, and the Elementary Detective Agency are dispatched to recapture them. Norman leads the group to a seedy casino for what should be an easy mission…only to be confronted by enemies from the not-so-distant past. To make matters worse, these villains appear to be a lot stronger than they once were. And as the battle heats up, the line between ‘human’ and ‘monster’ becomes that much thinner...

Ryünosuke Akutagawa (1892-1927) is one of Japan’s foremost stylists - a modernist master whose short stories are marked by highly original imagery, cynicism, beauty and wild humour. ‘Rashömon’ and ‘In a Bamboo Grove’ inspired Kurosawa’s magnificent film and depict a past in which morality is turned upside down, while tales such as ‘The Nose’, ‘O-Gin’ and ‘Loyalty’ paint a rich and imaginative picture of a medieval Japan peopled by Shoguns and priests, vagrants and peasants. And in later wo...

Akutagawa’s magical final work is a short novel with a magic spell all its own—poignant, fantastical, wry, melancholic, and wittyThe Kappa is a creature from Japanese folklore known for dragging unwary toddlers to their deaths in rivers: a scaly, child-sized creature, looking something like a frog, but with a sharp, pointed beak and an oval-shaped saucer on top of its head, which hardens with age.Akutagawa’s Kappa is narrated by Patient No. 23, a ma...

There is something about the number 3.The Ancient Greeks believed 3 was the perfect number, and in China 3 has always been a lucky number, and they know a thing or two.Most religions also have 3 this and 3 that and, of course, in these more modern times, three’s a crowd may be too many, except when it’s a ménage à trois. It seems good things usually come in threes.Whatever history and culture says WE think 3, a hat-trick of stories, is a great number to explore them...

The Spiders Thread is Akutagawas most well-known short story. It is an exquisite allegory about good, evil and redemption. Kandata, the wicked criminal sent to Hell for his sins, is given a chance to save himself, thanks to the Buddha remembering that he had once spared the life of a little spider. But Kandatas fate is sealed for all eternity when he tries to save himself at the expense of others. “The Spiders Thread” is a timeless morality tale that is as relevant to societies in the 21st...

'Oh the cruelty of time, that destroys all things!'Beguiling, strange and hair-raising tales from early 20th century Japan: Nagai's Behind the Prison, Uno's Closet LLB and Akutagawa's deeply macabre General Kim.Penguin Modern: fifty new books celebrating the pioneering spirit of the iconic Penguin Modern Classics series, with each one offering a concentrated hit of its contemporary, international flavour. Here are authors ranging from Kat...

Writing at the beginning of the twentieth century, Ryunosuke Akutagawa created disturbing stories out of Japan's cultural upheaval. Rashomon tells the chilling story of the killing of a samurai through the testimony of witnesses, including the spirit of the murdered man. The fable-like Yam Gruel is an account of desire and humiliation, but one in which the reader's sympathy is thoroughly unsettled. And in The Martyr, a beloved orphan raised by Jesuit priests is exiled when he refuses to ad...

Introducing Little Clothbound Classics: irresistible, mini editions of short stories, novellas and essays from the world's greatest writers, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-Smith.Celebrating the range and diversity of Penguin Classics, they take us from snowy Japan to springtime Vienna, from haunted New England to a sun-drenched Mediterranean island, and from a game of chess on the ocean to a love story on the moon. Beautifully designed and printed, ...

For fans of Shōgun: The best stories by the father of the Japanese short story—including the two that inspired Kurosawa's classic samurai film about the subjectivity of truth—featuringan introduction by Haruki MurakamiRyünosuke Akutagawa is one of Japan's foremost stylists—a modernist master whose short stories are marked by highly original imagery, cynicism, beauty and wild humour. "Rashömon"and "In a Bamboo Grove" inspired Kurosawa's magnificent film and...