And so tonight I have finished book two of Suzuki's Ring Trilogy!
We follow a certain Dr. Ando who is still recovering from the death of his only son at sea. He does an autopsy on an old friend, who under strange circumstances has passed away.
And that friend turns out to be the cynical philosophy professor Ryuji Takayama, and his corpse has something to tell Ando. But Ryuji is not the only thing, or the only one, who has chosen to make his reappearance.
"Spiral" pretty much picks up where "Ring" left off, but instead story follows a completely different character entirely, Dr. Ando. So it is now Ando who is confronted with the mystery of the Ring curse. And that mystery is starting to change.
And change it certainly does! This is quite a reinvention that Suzuki pulled off with the second installment of this trilogy. Obviously he wrote to be a stand alone work, but that didn't stop it from becoming a sequel regardless.
This sequel took me by surprise. Sure the story gets a whole stranger in "Spiral" but I like strange to begin with! I honestly think Suzuki would be considered as a master of the wierd tale in some ways. And I do honestly mean that!
by i-the-muso-1968