I recently finished reading Manchukuo 1987, by a person known by the pseudonym Yoshimi Red on Twitter who blogs at lateral thinking. It’s in the Sci-Fi section in Amazon, and presented as an alternative history military sci-fi detective novel by Yoshimi themself, which I think is a good description. I think it’s self-published (sorry Yoshimi Red if I’m wrong!), which means it’s quite cheap, and I recommend it strongly. This is my review, the first half of which will be spoiler-free and the second half of which will have some very mild spoilers.
The Setting
The novel is set in an alternative history where world war 2 kind of staggered to a stalemate, leaving Japan in possession of some of its colonies, un-nuked and essentially undefeated, with the Soviets and Nazis similarly surviving the war with some kind of territorial integrity. It’s 1987, the fag-end of the Showa era, and the Japanese empire is crumbling, Korea and Taiwan already independent and Japan’s final colony, Manchukuo, about to achieve independence in a negotiated agreement that will see the nation become independent from both the rest of mainland China (ruled by the KMT – there is no communist China in this alternative history) and Japan, under its frail and ageing emperor Puyi[1]. The Japanese empire doesn’t want to give up its territories but has been forced to by age, circumstance and general failure, but in the process of hanging onto its final territory it committed various terrible crimes, especially in past military campaigns against communist insurgents outside the cities. There is a general air of fascism everywhere in this setting, with much talk of racial purity laws, government slogans and propaganda and police everywhere, and a clear dual class system with the Manchurian people on the bottom, Japanese settlers in the middle, and Japanese from the original Island at the top. It’s a disastrous society waiting to explode. The story is set in Ryujin, a small city on the Manchurian coast.
The story
The main character, Munekata, is an aging member of the Kempeitai, Japan’s military police, with nothing to do while he waits for the end of the empire. He does a side hustle in private investigations and he has a bad history as a soldier in an infamous unit known for war crimes, and he spends his days burdened under the sense of his own decline, the collapse of the empire he gave his life to, and the growing decadence and seediness of the society he is in. He has a dodgy relationship with a woman called Hana, has a string of bad past relationships and bad decisions, and is generally not in a good frame of mind.
Munekata gets tasked with investigating a crime that was committed against a young Japanese settler girl called Sachiko, and with nothing else to do he decides to take the quest for justice for Sachiko seriously. He is helped by Hana, and in the process gets entangled with various elements of the Chinese society of Ryujin – a rich author who collaborates with Japanese occupiers, a criminal gang, an extremely racist Japanese settler schoolgirl, and various representatives of the military. Of course he slowly uncovers a terrible secret behind the crime, and as colonial society begins to unravel under the pressure of the looming independence agreement he, too, begins to fall apart, driven to violent extremes in his quest to solve the crime and find justice for Sachiko.
The Verdict
This is a really good book. It is well-written, with an excellent pace and a simple, believable but engaging plot line that keeps you involved in the story without confusion, stupid twists, or sudden loss of coherence. As I read it I got a strong sense of hints of Mishima[2], which to me is good (I like all the Mishima I’ve read), along with hints of Richard Morgan and William Gibson. It’s difficult to pin down exactly the genre and style because it blends so many elements of alternative history, detective fiction, film noir, science fiction and political thriller, but I think it merges them really well.
The setting is a brilliant attempt at describing life in the Asian Co-prosperity Sphere as it falls apart, which blends elements of Japanese and Chinese culture really well, lays out a convincing and believable alternative history, and describes the politics of colonial power really well. This is why I describe it as post-colonial detective noir, because Yoshimi balances the differing forces at play in an imperial colony in a way that makes them both believable and powerful parts of the story. The tension between collaborators and criminals, the compromises ordinary Chinese have to make, the confused racism of the settlers and the spiteful nature of their dependent relationship with the locals, are all very well laid out so that the many terrible and complicated decisions people have to make – and the social pressures that drive those decisions – make perfect sense. In truth except for The Man in the High Castle I haven’t read any attempts at alternative history of the Japanese empire, so I guess I can’t compare, but this is a great description that works really well.
The characters are also very well developed and believable, and I did not at any point finding myself giving up in frustration because their flaws were too great, nor did I ever find myself finding their decisions or actions unbelievable or stupid or inconceivable. In the circumstances, they really made sense and their actions were coherent and consistent. The author’s voice focuses primarily on Munekata and his inner life, but regularly switches to give insights into the feelings and thoughts of the other characters, especially Hana and the racist schoolgirl Mizuki. There are a lot of secrets and dirty motivations in these three people’s hidden lives, and seeing them try to figure themselves out and deal with their pasts, their prejudices and their beliefs is a lot of fun.
Also the ending is great. Read this book!
Don’t read this book if …
Every book has stylistic elements that some people won’t like, no matter how good it is, and this book is no exception. I think it will help to read this book if you know a little about Japanese and Chinese culture, since there is occasionally slang and reference to specific elements of e.g. Buddhism and Chinese history, and there are some elements of the setting that will make more sense if you have some familiarity with these cultures. If you aren’t into Asian culture at all, then don’t bother with this book!
A particular issue some readers might have with this book is the rather unpleasant nature of the main characters. Munekata is basically a reformed killer, a war criminal, listless and aimless and very cynical, and although I enjoyed reading about his struggles I can understand that some people might find him too unsympathetic. His relationship with Hana is quite awful, and she’s very mean to him. Hana herself is a very compromised and confused character, as is Mizuki, and and these kinds of characters don’t appeal to everyone. Their personalities are at times quite bleak, and I understand that doesn’t appeal to everyone. But as a counterpoint, I’m actually the kind of reader who usually gives up on a story if there aren’t any redeeming or sympathetic characters, and I really enjoyed reading about these guys, so it’s probably worth challenging yourself even if you don’t normally like these types of characters.
Finally, I guess I should say that (to me at least) this book seems quite explicitly post-colonial, in that it is describing a colonial society with an obviously critical voice – I don’t think anyone could make the mistake of thinking that Japan’s 1987 Manchurian colony is meant to be a positive place or a force for good on the Chinese mainland. If you’re not into post-colonial literature, you might want to give this a pass – but in that case you’d be missing out, and I recommend you reform your reading habits.
Finally there are a few editing errors that occasionally jar, but for a self-published book who cares? Yoshimi, don’t waste your money on an editor!
About the setting
[Possible mild spoilers ahead]
The setting is very well described. In addition to the sense of a crumbling empire, lethargic under its own weight and obviously being abandoned by the imperial core, there is also a very vividly described sense of late-Showa indecision and staleness. Everyone I speak to in Japan has this criticism of the late Show period, that nobody was making decisions and everyone was just fumbling along, not sure what to do or how to get along. In real history at this time Japan was hurtling towards a bubble, with the young people of the era living hedonistic lives of great wealth and consumption while the nation’s leaders – largely born in early Showa, who Japanese people sometimes refer to with disdain as Showa shoki danshi – fiddled and refused to take the actions they needed to turn the economy away from its disastrous path. In this alternative history there is no mention of the bubble economy in the main islands, but it is very clear that the colony of Manchuria is falling apart and no one in the leadership has any ideas about what to do. Stubborn, narrow-minded, inflexible and incurious, the leadership are classic Showa leaders and the sense of everything crumbling while they fiddle around and faff is great.
The story also features another classic of Japanese literature, especially manga: the secret machinations and conflicts between branches of government. Munekata is in the military police, but formerly he was in a special army of super-powered combat-suit wearing mass murderers called the Survey Unit, who spent their time raiding villages and burning them and killing everyone to save them from themselves. Then they were just kind of disbanded in disgrace and Munekata was moved to the military police, where he is kind of not on good terms with other elements of his own police force and the broader military. Everyone is spying on everyone, and of course the plot Munekata uncovers involves different branches of the military and civil society playing off against each other for their own stupid ends that they all pretend are for the good of the emperor. This is a super common element of Japanese fiction, representing in my opinion unresolved social trauma and political memories from the war (which was famously undermined by the conflict between the Navy and the Army), and it’s good to see it reproduced in brutal form here.
As part of the setting we regularly have memories of Munekata’s period in the Survey Unit, which was a nasty organization that really helps us to understand that this imperial venture in Manchukuo was evil. During those flashbacks we learn slowly about “the vast plains”, the areas outside the cities that are essentially breeding grounds for a communist insurgency[3]. They play a role similar to “the bush” in an Australian novel, or the hinterlands in a typical post-apocalyptic story, and lurk on the edge of the story like a threat. Meanwhile in the city there is a criminal underground and a teeming underclass of desperate Chinese, held in subjection by the Japanese colonial overlords and constantly ready to erupt in violence. Nobody in settler society is willing to confront the reality of this underclass and what they’re going to do when imperial oversight ends. It’s great, the lurking threat of communists on “the vast plains” and rage-filled colonial subjects in the city, all slowly heating to boiling point …
Finally, there is a lot of effort in this story to imagine how society would have developed in this imperial setting, where two historically very closely linked societies are trapped in an unequal struggle based on violence and possession. The characters describe two new forms of Japanese: Kyowa-go, which is a mixture of Chinese and Japanese used to communicate with the many colonial subjects who work alongside the Japanese settlers (like civil police, servants and so on); and Armee Japanisch, a German loan-word, which describes a kind of authoritarian and bullying version of Japanese used to threaten and cower colonial subjects. Although this is mostly used by Munekata, other characters occasionally use it mockingly or in defense. Alongside this we see other aspects of the merging of colonial and settler classes on the fringe of the society, and we also hear rumours about colonial families that have come undone through sexual interaction with colonial society, or through crime and entanglements. In some ways like Burmese Days, we see this primarily through the viewpoints and antagonisms of the settler Japanese (Munekata and Mizuki), which also means we don’t fully understand their nuance or their depth. This is a really engrossing and engaging construction of an alternative history society.
Finally, there is a constant overlay of fascism on all of this. Settler characters refer constantly to the racial purity laws (when they were in place, when they were removed, how they need to be navigated), Munekata is familiar with and occasionally references the extensive secret police files on everyone in the city, and the settlers themselves live in a walled-off, separate area of the city that is heavily guarded. At the same time there are attempts to build a long-term functioning society from this unequal division of racial rights, so we regularly see references to pictures and slogans that depict Manchurians and Japanese working side by side to build the nation or to fight of communists. I imagine that living in Rhodesia near the end would have been quite similar to many of the social systems in place in Manchukuo in 1987, and they are brought vividly to life by the excellent writing.
Final notes
This is a great book, really well written and set in a carefully crafted and very complete alternative history, an imagined past where Japan got to implement its vision of the racial order of the Asia-Pacific. Its political and social themes are nuanced and carefully described, its characters are deep and engaging, the physical setting is very well described and feels vividly real, and the story is gripping and engaging. I strongly recommend this book!
fn1: Yes, the Puyi from the Last Emperor, still hanging onto life and established as a “co-equal” emperor (in name if not formally) with the Japanese emperor.
fn2: I know Mishima is a weirdo gay fascist, so sorry Yoshimi if that comparison annoys you, but I think he was a great writer, a kind of Japanese DH Lawrence.
fn3: Mao is dead, executed by the army, but the insurgency lives on, trying to take over both Manchukuo and Kuomintang China, opposed by the Japanese in the former and the “liberal” Chinese government in the latter.
Compromise and Conceit 
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