The Fiend with Twenty Faces

This was a fun and quirky crime story. Light an intriguing. It's short so give it a go as it will not take !I g to get through.

I'm Japanese and I used to read this Fiend of Twenty Faces series over and over again when I was a kid. (Zen's comment is right - This story was originally written for kids, mostly Grade 3-7 kids.) I am so excited to find this translation, for just recently I read this story to my kids in Japanese and my bilingual daughter wanted to re-read it in English. I like this translation, which precisely follows the original story. However, I do not like the illustrations.... First, as I understand it, the Fiend with Twenty Faces is a sort of gentleman who does not like violence -- he never kills or injures anyone. He is a young handsome man, who is super-smart. So he should not be depicted as an apparently vicious villain like the man on the cover page. Second, in one illustration in which a boy named Kobayashi is supposed to disguise himself as a statue of buddha, he doesn't look like a Buddha at all. Third, in the story Kobayashi is depicted as a cute smart boy who looks like a pretty chipmunk, but he doesn't look that cute in those illustrations. . . Fourth, the cover page may suggest that this book is a Manga, but it's originally a classical juvenile chapter book. I sincerely wish that its revised version will come with new illustrations.

This is an entertaining and fun mystery for teens and adults. The author brings the Intrepid Reader right into the story with his comments to the reader. It was hard to wait to see what happened next. Some translated books are hard to read and follow. This one is smoothly done and very easy to get involved in. This author has written more books in this series. I hope we can see #2 translated very soon!

It's great to see this piece of classic children's detective literature published in English. Be aware that it's very much aimed at kids: the story itself almost teaches kids how to read and think through detective fiction, so it would be especially good for young readers (no serious violence, death, or gore). My main complaint is about the illustrations. They're not at all as good as they should be.

An entertaining read if you want an easy to digest crime fiction novel from the 1930s.