Title: The Moving Blade
Subtitle: A Tokyo Mystery
Author: Michael Pronko
Publisher: Raked Gravel Press
ISBN: 978-1942410164
Pages: 319
Genre: Crime / Thriller
Reviewed by: Joe Kilgore
Hollywood Book Review
This is author Pronko’s second novel in his Detective Hiroshi series. The book is packed with intrigue, suspense, and mystery—all the things that make a thriller thrilling—but it’s also filled with detail, rich characterizations, and vivid scene descriptions—all the things that make a good book good.
In this offering, Hiroshi is pulled into an investigation with international implications. A famous American ex-pat has been killed. The day of his funeral, his house is burglarized and ransacked. His daughter, who has returned from the United States for the funeral and disposition of her father’s affairs, soon draws Hiroshi’s attention as he’s investigating another murder that might be related. But he’s not the only one with an interest in the beautiful young American and especially her father’s estate, which includes priceless Japanese books and artifacts plus his writings—the latest of which being a manuscript he had been working on and a speech he was about to give to a Tokyo conference of diplomats from around the world. The political implications of the book and speech are potentially explosive. So much so that a high-placed Japanese government official is doing everything she can to get control of both.
As the conference nears, so too do more attempts to find the writings or convince the daughter to relinquish them. Mayhem begins to mount as muggings escalate to murder and no one seems safe for very long. Hiroshi is beset with concerns as his growing feelings for the young American blossom even as he’s contemplating the perplexities of the case, a potential career move to Interpol, and the re-emergence of a love from his youth.
All of the above may seem overly complicated. If so, that’s my fault, not the writer’s. Pronko is a skilled craftsman at harmoniously blending plot, subplots, sidebars, and backstories. He creates vibrant characters that actually react and behave more like real people than stock players. He also fills his pages with descriptions of Tokyo’s gleaming boulevards, tawdry back alleys, quite gardens, and public buildings that make all the environs as interesting as the participants in this multilevel tale.
Continually intellectually involving, The Moving Blade doesn’t spare the action either. Suspenseful encounters often hover on the periphery of violence. while others break out into savagely frightening life and death struggles that hang on the razor thin edges of Samurai swords. This is a crime thriller that will stimulate your head, your heart, and your adrenal glands simultaneously. And really, isn’t that the best kind?