The interest in all things eastern continues. Two of Japan’s ‘cultural icons’, Detective Yoshitato Katayama and his crime-solving calico cat, are coming to the UK, thanks to MacLehose Press winning a nine-way auction for four novels in Jiro Akagawa’s bestselling Mikeneko Holmes series.
Senior commissioning editor Paul Engles acquired world English rights from Bruno Onuki Reynell at New River Literary, on behalf of Kohei Hattori at English Agency and Japanese publisher Kobunsha.
Originally launched in the late 1970s, The Casebooks of Mikeneko Holmes follows Detective Yoshitato Katayama and his crime-solving calico cat, and has inspired films and television adaptations. Akagawa has published around 650 books. The first novel,A Game of Cat and Killer, will be published in September 2026.
A Game of Cat and Killer sees the unlikely detective duo investigate a series of murders at a women’s university in Tokyo after Holmes’ owner is killed.
Engles said: “Akagawa’s prose is brisk and light-footed, with a plot to match, making this a novel to be devoured in one sitting. One of its great pleasures is the urbane, cosmopolitan world it opens up: Japan before the bubble burst, a society balancing the competing forces of tradition and progress. Best of all, with three further Mikeneko casebooks following hot on the heels of the first, there’s plenty more to get your claws into.”