Susan Spann, The Flask of the Drunken Master

Susan Spann, The Flask of the Drunken Master

A Thomas Dunne Book/Minotaur/St. Martin’s
© 2015 Susan Spann
ISBN 978-1-250-02706-1

This is the third in the (so far) excellent series of mysteries, set in Japan in the late 1500s.  The main character Matsui Hiro (his work name, as it happens), is a shinobi (think ninja); his clan has been hired to protect a Portuguese Catholic priest, Father Mateo Avila de Santos, who is attempting to convert ordinary Japanese to Catholicism.  A large part of the stories involves Hiro trying to understand the thoughts of Mateo, while Mateo has to learn about how—and why—the Japanese people respond as they do.

The historical setting is well done and (based on a small amount of reading) seems accurate.  Looming in the background (mostly; sometimes this becomes a significant part of the story) are dynastic machinations over the control of the Emperor, and, thus, of Japan.  And the Portuguese mission to Japan is also factual (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Catholic_Church_in_Japan)--it even achieved a fair amount of success until Catholicism was banned in the early 1600s.

In this entry in the series, the political ramifications remain in the background.  A relatively unsuccessful sake brewer (Chikao) has been found dead, presumably murdered, behind Ginjiro’s brewery.  He and Ginjiro were known to have argued, and so the yoriki think policeman) has arrested Ginjiro.  Neither Hiro (who has occasionally visited Ginjiro’s establishment) nor Mateo think it likely that Ginjiro is the murdered, and prevail on Chikao’s widow to ask the magistrate to postpone Ginjiro’s trial.  They have four days to find evidence that will clear Ginjiro and, presumably, implicate someone else.

They are not lacking for possible suspects.  There’s Chikao’s son Kaoru, an impulsive, often drunk ne’er-do-well, who is deeply in debt.  And his debts have made it difficult for Chikao and his partner Ren to expand and upgrade their brewery (with the goal of being able to join the sake brewer’s guild.  And Ren, who finds Chikao’s indulgence of his son to be a hindering their efforts.  Basho, a wealthy rice merchant has also been behaving oddly.  Akechi Yoshiko, a female samurai who was become a debt collector and guard (to support her mother) might well have been trying to collect from Chikao.  And the constantly drunken monk Suke was on the scene and claims to be the murderer.

Mateo and Hiro investigate (and it is in the course of their investigation that we learn more about their beliefs and about their cultural differences).  Eventually, more or less at the last minute, Hiro thinks he has the solution and he and Mateo talk their way into the magistrate’s hearing.  And in a scene reminiscent of Perry Mason, Hiro builds a case that reveals the truly guilty party.

I find the relationship between Hiro and Mateo (and the other two members of Mateo’s household) to be well done, and to have become deeper as the series progresses.  Spann’s plots are intricate, but fair to the reader.  I find myself becoming involved, especially with the two main characters and more and more interested in the setting.  This is a series that has yet to disappoint me and has grown richer and deeper as it proceeds.