Infection Game tells an exciting, thoughtful murder mystery about crime and punishment and justice, and I really like what the murderer/mastermind did in the end of the story.
PS: I like how the different cops, their personalities and motivation are described too.
This book left me a little bit confused. I had fun reading it, but I felt a disconnection with the characters. I felt the story of the powerful and their running away of responsibilities interesting enough (even if more of the same), but I just couldn't feel invested in it.
Maybe is Honda's writing style which is easy to read, and with lots of conversations, but not really much into character development. Maybe it is because this is not the first in a series (of which I had no idea when I got it at the library) and much of the character development has been done before: we already know the characters, let's get to business. Maybe it had to do with the way the plot develops, with different short stories converging into a big picture of which I really was not so much interested.
The story goes around some 'random' attacks to old Japanese men who held positions of power in the public service and went to work to the private (or retired, or...). There seems to be an under-plot about a medical product that was the reason some Japanese people got sick (and some killed themselves over it, etc.). And the police investigates it.
As I said, all good enough. You get a mystery (who is killing, why, etc.), the police working to know what happened, some dark stuff from the people in power... But again, as I said, I couldn't really feel invested in the story and sometimes I found myself wondering if the characters that were talking had appeared before on the story or if it was the first time they were making an appearance. And there is something wrong if you don't remember the names of the characters of the story (with me or with the book).
The best: easy to read; it has the atmosphere
The worst: more of the same about the ones in power being bad (but we don't do anything to change things), the characters are very stereotypical and shallow (we don't really get to know much about them); not much of a mystery here
Alternatives: Kyôtarô Nishimura comes to mind; Edogawa Rampo if you want dark and bloody and creepy and bizarre; your 'Scandinavian' authors like Camilla Läckberg; maybe that's the thing, there are too many options out there and "感染遊戯" doesn't particularly stand out