Ring by Koji Suzuki Search Amazon for other books by or about Koji Suzuki. Rating: Reviewed by: John Walsh

Newspaper reporter Asakawa cannot help but notice the coincidence when two healthy young people die at exactly the same moment from apparently inexplicable heart seizures; after all, one of them is his 17 year old niece. His journalistic impulses start to goad him into action and he discovers that two other young people also suffered the same fate, in eerily similar circumstances and at exactly the same moment. What appears at first to be coincidence is soon revealed not to be and Asakawa becomes increasingly obsessed with solving the mystery that is posed by the mystery. His professional and family life both suffer after he discovers a video tape that the four young people have watched together, a video that threatens all who watch it that they will die within exactly one week. Can Asakawa and his eccentric friend Ryuji work out how to prevent the same fate befalling them within one week?

Some readers will be familiar with Koji Suzuki's novel through its film treatment The Ring, starring Naomi Watts, which was itself a remake of a Japanese film of the same story. The film diverges from the book in a number of ways, perhaps most notable of which – apart from some of the plot twists – is the nature of the central characters, who are much less attractive than we are accustomed to seeing in Hollywood films. Asakawa himself almost completely ignores his family unless it suits him and expects unquestioning obedience from his wife – at one point he wishes she would live up to her name, which in Japanese means 'silence.' His companion Ryuji, meanwhile, claims to be a serial rapist and is possibly conducting an inappropriate relationship with one of his own students. It is hard to imagine such a character being considered suitable for the big screen, no matter how much dumbed down for the mass audience. These aspects of character are in fact explorations of some aspects of Japanese culture and personality, which are in some ways quite different from those of the west. In terms of plot, the structure and explanation is more logical than that of the films, albeit slightly less striking aesthetically. Some people, at least, will find it interesting to compare the novel and the film and consider which is more striking.

Ring is an engrossing tale with some genuinely disturbing moments, which are intensified for the unexpected ways in which the moments of drama are constructed. The translation by Robert B Rohmer and Glynne Walley is functional but too often for my taste veers into Americanism. Nevertheless, this will provide great pleasure to readers who enjoy thrillers and mysteries with a supernatural tinge.