UPDATE2: Best-selling Japanese mystery author Keigo Higashino dies of cancer at 68

Keigo Higashino, a hugely popular Japanese author known for his numerous mystery novels including “The Devotion of Suspect X,” died of bowel cancer on Thursday, his publishers said Monday. He was 68.

A native of Osaka in western Japan, Higashino started writing novels while working as an engineer at what is now auto parts maker Denso Corp. His fame spread to other Asian countries such as South Korea and China on par with Japanese author Haruki Murakami.

In 1985, he won the Edogawa Rampo Prize, a Japanese award for unpublished mystery novels, for “Hokago (After School)” and became a full-time writer the following year. He received the Mystery Writers of Japan Award in 1999 for “Himitsu (Naoko),” solidifying his position as a mystery writer.

His most well-known works include “Byakuyako (Journey Under the Midnight Sun),” which depicts a journey of two young people bound by murder in their childhood and was adapted into a TV drama, as well as “Yogisha X no Kenshin (The Devotion of Suspect X),” which won the prestigious Naoki Prize and was the third installment in the detective Galileo series featuring genius physicist Manabu Yukawa.

The Galileo series, which was also adapted into a TV drama series and films starring Japanese actor and singer Masaharu Fukuyama, became a massive hit, selling over 10 million copies in total.

“Having lived as one of the residents of Higashino’s works, I feel very close to the life he put into them and I still feel his life is here, so I cannot yet say goodbye,” Fukuyama said on social media. “As one of those residents and as a reader, I want to remain captivated by the stories he created.”

The death of the best-selling author came as a surprise with the latest installment in the Galileo series scheduled for release on Aug. 5, bringing his total number of published works to 106. Higashino’s cumulative domestic print run exceeds 100 million copies.

His work often explored the circumstances and inner thoughts of people who commit crime, portraying their anguish and at the same time making it a page-turning piece of entertainment.

“What is in my mind is to write things that will entertain readers and to become a writer whose work people are eager to read,” Higashino said when he received the Medal with Purple Ribbon from the Japanese government in 2023.

Higashino also received acclaim in the English literary world. “The Devotion of Suspect X” was nominated for Best Novel at the Edgar Allan Poe Awards in the United States, while “Newcomer” was shortlisted in the translation category of the British Crime Writers’ Association’s Dagger awards.

In China, where Higashino’s popular works including “The Miracles of the Namiya General Store” were made into films, many mourned his death on the Weibo social media platform, with one post praising Higashino for publishing “many good pieces.”

Taiwan’s Central News Agency called Higashino a “mystery novel writer representing Japan” in its report of his death. A major bookstore commented on its website that his works combine “entertainment with literary value.”

© KYODO