[DeepL Translation - needs review] "To guard both the body of my daughter and the heart of my wife.
that is the mission given to me as a father."
Winner of the 52nd Japan Mystery Writers Association Award
Based on the movie "The Secret" starring Ryoko Hirose
Heiseke Sugita is an ordinary family man whose happy home is suddenly shattered by an accident. His daughter Monami miraculously survives a bus accident that kills most of the passengers. But in a twist of fate, her body is inhabited by ...
A devastating book that will remain with me for a long time
Don't let the premise put you off. There are no scenes of incest in this book. No scenes of sex, either.
Imagine you lost your wife to an accident, but your daughter miraculously survived. But wait -- it's your wife's consciousness in your daughter's body? Turns out this is much more devastating than your actual daughter surviving. You have to mourn your wife in front of the rest of the world, but it's your daughter who you desperately miss. And you can't treat your wife as your wife, either. In a way, you've lost both, but no one can understand your pain.
This book made me think a lot about familial love, romantic love, youth, missed opportunities, and grief. I haven't cried this much while reading a book in a long time, and I suspect that the ending will stay with me for a long time, like those of 백야행 and 용의자 X의 헌신. A quiet, complicated, and poignant book. I encourage you to give it a chance, hopefully push on to the end and think for yourself about the meaning of the "secret" referenced in the title.