Fated (it is my own translation, I'm not sure it is correct) is a disappointing melodrama by Keigo Higashino. I got so bored in the middle of the story that I skimmed to read the ending...and then I was like "Oh, that's it. That's the ending. It is not bad, but it is not very exciting neither. No point in reading any further."
This novel still carries plenty of Keigo Higashino's trademark problems when characters, story and writing is considered. I feel nothing for any of the characters--not saying that these characters are badly written, but they are just not...interesting. The murder mystery is half-baked as best, and the story itself is............as flat and as tasteless as reading a piece of news from a newspaper.
*sighs* I just need to rant about Keigo Higashino's tone whenever he is writing his novels: he inserts too much Big Talk about fate and destiny and human nature and the dark side of the society and whatnot in order to impress his audience---and it works because everyone and their mother is praising Keigo Higashino for being such a master novelist but I am not buying any of these, I hate being lectured by this guy and I think most of his novels are overrated and freaking boring.
If I had better books to read, I won't pick Higashino's books up. Case closed.
Dark, calm, mysterious, and sad. I always like reading novels by Higashino Keigo. Just like other ones this one was also dark but in a very slow - quiet kind of a way. The plot was sort of like "Lemon" (or 分身) also by the same author.
At the end of the story, the detective, the main character of this book, figures out that his old enemy is his twin brother. They were adopted by different families when they were babies. In addition to that, the detective heard that his brother changed a plain arrow to a poisonous one, so the killer could definitely kill the target. That means his brother must be arrested for aiding a murder!
But the detective does nothing. He just has a chit-chat with his brother, asking, "Who's the elder one?"
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.