Hiroshima Boy

LA gardener Mas Arai returns to Hiroshima to bring his best friend's ashes to a relative on the tiny offshore island of Ino, only to become embroiled in the mysterious death of a teenage boy who was about the same age Mas was when he survived the atomic bomb in 1945. The boy's death affects the elderly, often-curmudgeonly, always-reluctant sleuth, who cannot return home to Los Angeles until he finds a way to see justice served.

About the author

Naomi Hirahara: Naomi Hirahara is the Edgar-winning author of the Mas Arai mystery series, including Gasa Gasa Girl, Summer of the Big Bachi, Snakeskin Shamesin, and Blood Hina. She is also the author of the new series of L.A.-based Ellie Rush mysteries, published by Penguin. Her Mas Arai books have earned such honors as the Chicago Tribune’s Ten Best Mysteries and Thrillers and Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year. The Stanford University alumna was born and raised in Altadena, CA, where her protagonist lives; she now resides in the adjacent town of Pasadena, CA.

Summary

The Final Mas Arai Mystery

After surviving the atomic bomb in 1945, Mas Arai returned to Hiroshima only once, fifty years ago, to find himself a bride. Now the retired, 86-year-old Los Angeles gardener is going back out of obligation, to deliver his best friend Haruo's ashes to Haruo's sister. As soon as he arrives at her nursing home on a small island off Hiroshima, he becomes embroiled in the mysterious death of a teenage boy who was about the same age Mas was when the Bomb fell.

Mas knows he's too old to be chasing murderer suspects, and being back in Hiroshima brings up terrifying memories, but he simply cannot ignore his curiosity and desire for justice. Mas's keen eye, quiet determination, and focused moral compass lead him on a quest through the past—and into the future—in a journey that he never expected.

Foreword

National print, online, and podcast campaign focusing on the mystery market

Social media campaign

Advertising in Mystery Scene magazine

Co-op available

ARC giveaways to SCIBA, Left Coast Crime, & other key events

Bookseller and library promotions: LibraryThing, Edelweiss, and Goodreads

Extensive events in Southern California, at mystery conferences, and wherever the author is asked to speak

Author promotion via the various mystery and crime organizations she is part of (i.e., Sisters in Crime).

Targeted advertising with SCIBA, the mystery press, and Facebook.

Promotion through www.naomihirahara.com

Author speaking and signing engagements at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, SCIBA, LitFest Pasadena, and key mystery-writer conferences.

Author is a frequently requested speaker at libraries, conferences, panels, and Japanese-American organizations.

Cross-promotion tied to author's other LA-based mystery series published by Penguin.

Outreach for interviews/features in large regional publications, especially Los Angeles Magazine, the Los Angeles Times, Arroyo Monthly, and more, as well as in the mystery-review world. Further outreach to publications in other towns where she will be visiting and/or has a following, including Phoenix, Hawaii, and the Bay Area.

Additional text

"I’ve always admired Naomi Hirahara’s Mas Arai. A brilliant, unique addition to mystery fiction from the very beginning, his character has straddled time, place, and culture, with roots in one of the most terrible acts of violence war has ever inflicted upon humanity. And Mas has prevailed while growing older in a country that does not always value the wisdom of its elders, or those who work with their hands. This may be the last entry in the series (really?), but I am sure readers will come to love Mas for years to come—he is one of a kind. Hiroshima Boy is a wonderful finale to a fine mystery series. Kudos to Naomi Hirahara."
— Jacqueline Winspear, author of the New York Times–bestselling Maisie Dobbs mysteries

“With Hiroshima Boy, Naomi Hirahara offers readers another fine, artfully understated story about a man who believes himself to be average, yet is anything but. Carrying the ashes of his deceased best friend, Mas Arai returns to Hiroshima, where he spent his childhood and was witness to the bomb that devastated the city and its populace. When Mas stumbles onto the body of a murdered boy, what began as a simple mission to keep a recent promise becomes a complex journey in understanding the past. Like a Zen poet, Hirahara creates a quiet surface with a powerful storm beneath. The novel purports to be the last in this Edgar Award–winning series. We can only hope that Naomi Hirahara has a change of heart.”
— William Kent Krueger, New York Times–bestselling author of Ordinary Grace and the Cork O’Connor mysteries

Product details

• Authors: Naomi Hirahara
• Publisher: Ingram Publishers Services
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 08.01.2019
• EAN: 9781945551628
• ISBN: 978-1-945551-62-8
• No. of pages: 216
• Series: Mas Arai Mystery; Mas Arai Mystery; The Mas Arai Mystery Series
• Subjects: Fiction > Suspense; FICTION / Mystery & Detective / Cozy / General, FICTION / Asian American