★ From the author of the 5‑million‑copy bestseller “Villain” and Akutagawa Prize winner Shuichi Yoshida – his first spy novel and the most entertaining hard‑boiled thriller in his 17‑year career, written over ten years.
★ Adapted into both a TV drama (2020) and a film (2021) starring Japanese Academy Award‑winning actor Tatsuya Fujiwara and Ryoma Takeuchi. The heart‑pounding “bomb‑in‑the‑heart” countdown ignites the screen.
★ An energy war spanning Vietnam, Bulgaria, and China. The protagonist has a bomb implanted near his heart – it will detonate if he fails to contact headquarters every 24 hours. Trapped by time, life, and national interests, he fights to survive.

“AN Communications” appears to be a news wire service, but in reality it is a front for industrial espionage – buying and selling classified intelligence at high prices. Kazuhiko Takano and his partner Ryoichi Taoka work as agents for AN Communications, living a brutal existence.

A shooting occurs at a hospital in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Hours later, a Lunar New Year party is held at a large hotel. Among the guests are Takano, Taoka, Korean spy David Kim, Hong Kong Trust Bank chairman Andy Huang, and his companion AYAKO. At the party, the Vietnamese government announces the discovery of a new oil field in the South China Sea. Yet CNOX, the Chinese state‑owned energy conglomerate that should be highly interested, is absent. Andy Huang also says he will not be involved in the oil project. Takano begins to probe the true intentions of both sides.

While investigating a Japanese man shot in the earlier incident, Takano uncovers intelligence about a Uighur militant plot to bomb a stadium. Meanwhile, Taoka is kidnapped by unknown assailants. All AN Communications agents have a small explosive capsule implanted near their hearts. If contact is lost for a certain period, the device is remotely detonated to eliminate the risk of information leaks.

Shuichi Yoshida
Born in September 1968 in Nagasaki City, Japan. He graduated from Nagasaki Prefectural Nagasaki Minami High School and the Faculty of Business Administration at Hōsei University. After university, he worked at various part‑time jobs.

In 1997, he made his literary debut with “The Last Son,” which won the 84th Literary World Newcomer Prize and was also nominated for the 117th Akutagawa Prize. In 2002, he won the 15th Yamamoto Shūgorō Prize for “Parade” (Dōkyo Seikatsu) and, the same year, the 127th Akutagawa Prize for “Park Life.” Winning both a popular fiction prize and a pure literature prize in the same year made him a topic of much discussion.

His early works often depicted the lives of young city dwellers. Later, his full‑length novel “Villain” (Aku Nin), which deals with a murder case, won the 61st Mainichi Publishing Culture Award and the 34th Osaragi Jirō Award in 2007. In 2010, he received the 23rd Shibata Renzaburō Award for “Yokomichi Yonosuke.” In 2019, he won both the 69th Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology Award for Fine Arts and the 14th Chūōkōron Prize for Literature for “National Treasure.” He has served as a judge for the Akutagawa Prize since 2016.

He is a cat lover who lives with two cats: a Bengal cat named “Kin‑chan” (Kintarō) and a Scottish Fold named “Gin‑chan” (Gintarō). In 2017, he appeared with his beloved cats on the NHK Educational TV documentary series “Neko Mentary: Cats and Their People.”