The Sleeping Dragon

With The Sleeping Dragon, Miyuki Miyabe, Japan's #1 best-selling mystery author, returns to the spare, hard-boiled style of her debut book in English, the cult classic All She Was Worth. Add in a touch of the paranormal, and this noir tale of suspense is on track to garner reviews as glowing as those she's received in the past -- Land to win her a legion of new readers.

A fierce typhoon strikes Tokyo one night, flooding the city streets. Someone has unlawfully removed a manhole cover, and a little boy out searching for a lost pet goes missing, possibly drowned in the sewers. Is it murder or accidental? These events bring together a struggling journalist named Kosaka, who is grappling with the ghosts of his past, and two young men who may or may not have psychic powers. The three form an unwilling team not only to search for the lost boy, but also to solve a second mystery involving Kosaka's former fianci??e.

Kosaka's career and personal life have stagnated since his breakup with Saeko a few years earlier, and locked him in an emotional impasse. Each of his two reluctant comrades--Shinji and Naoya--is struggling to come to terms with his unique powers ("the dragon within"). While Shinji wants to use his abilities to help others, Naoya seeks to hide his. Kosaka, meanwhile, doubts the young men's ability, all-too-clearly aware that such claims of psychic knowledge of the crimes could in reality mask a criminal culpability. But then all three are forced into an unsteady alliance to try to save the life of someone close to Kosaka.

Best-selling author MIYUKI MIYABE has written more than 40 novels, including four previous, critically-praised works in English translation published by Kodansha International All She Was Worth, Shadow Family, Crossfire and The Devil's Whisper.