Koji Suzuki
When news reporter Kazuyuki Asakawa’s 17-year-old niece and three of her friends die from a sudden heart attack at the very same time, he is determined to get to the bottom of it. He traces the strange coincidence to an eerie video the four watched one week before their deaths, which told them exactly what would happen – unless they perform a certain task.
This part of the video, however, has been erased, and Asakawa and his friend Ryuji race against time to find out what they need to do to save their own lives. When Ryuji dies unexpectedly, Asakawa have to make a final choice between whom to save: his family or mankind.
I borrowed this book from the library without realizing that it had been made into a horror movie in 1998, eventually spawning an entire franchise. I don’t usually read horror (or romance), but this book is very light on the genre elements and does its trick without blood and gore. However, a dark presence looms throughout, and once Asakawa and Ryuji take the video’s threat seriously, the pace never slackens. I would rather call this “thriller with supernatural elements” than outright horror, and I don’t regret picking this up.
Koji Suzuki was born in 1957 in Hamamatsu near Tokyo and majored in French at Keio University. After holding a number of odd jobs – one of them writing books on child-rearing sharing the expertise he acquired as house husband taking care of two daughters – he published his first novel in 1990. Rakuen (Paradise) won the Japan Fantasy Novel Award, and Ring was made into successful movies both in Japan and, eventually, in Hollywood. Suzuki is often called the Stephen King of Japan. When he’s not roaming Japan in his RV, he lives in Tokyo.
If you’re in for a suspenseful thriller at the edge of the horror genre, get this book (or the whole series) from amazon.