The Miracles of the Namiya General Store by Keigo Higashino, translated by Sam Bett (Yen One)

The Miracles of the Namiya General Store was originally published in the literary magazine Shosetsu Yasei Jidai from April of 2011 to December of the same year. The Japanese title is ナミヤ雑件店の奇跡 (Namiya Zakkaten no Kiseki) and was published in book form in 2012 by Kadokawa Corporation. It was also adapted into a feature length film in 2017.  

The year is 2012 and three good-for-nothings, Atsuya, Shota, and Kohei, end up taking refuge in an old abandoned building after their latest robbery. The sign out front shows it to be the Namiya General Store. To their surprise, while they were hiding in the building, someone dropped a letter in through the mail slot. 

A notice had been floating on the Internet. It said, “From exactly midnight until daybreak, the Namiya General Store Advice Box will be reopening for one night only”. It is the same night the three delinquents break into the store. 

The boys decide to open the letter and read the contents. A woman wrote to the store asking for advice. However, the letter wasn’t addressed to anyone in particular, only to the Namiya General Store. Atsuya recalled seeing the name of the store in one of the magazines that was left in the house. He found the page he was looking for which featured a short article on the owner of the store, Yuji Namiya.

The article starts off by saying:

This neighborhood store has developed a reputation for being fully stocked with answers to life’s toughest questions. 

If you come to the Namiya General Store in XX city after hours and slip a letter through the mail slot in their shutter, an answer will be waiting for you in the milk crate around back in the morning. 

The boys become more confused because the article was written over forty years ago. And yet people are still leaving letters and asking for advice. The boys had opened the letter and felt the need to write her back. Atsuya was worried that Kohei had left his fingerprints on the letter they wrote, but as Kohei went to retrieve the letter, it was no longer in the box. There was a noise out front which Shota went to check on and in his hand was another letter. 

After a few more exchanges, the boys have determined that the letters have been coming from the past. They managed to narrow down the year to 1979. But they still have no idea why the house is functioning as a time machine. Following the first letter, the boys begin receiving other letters throughout the night. 

What started on a whim becomes more serious as the store continues to receive more letters. For each person who writes for advice, the boys answer to the best of their ability, in the same vein as the original owner.Their advice spawns many little miracles and intertwines with seemingly unrelated characters. It’s a night that will change their lives forever. 

Japan’s master of mystery, Keigo Higashino, has written a light-hearted fantasy that will make you laugh and cry, sometimes at the same time. In a world full of conflict, wars, and a pandemic, it is refreshing to read about miracles that will change people’s lives for the better. Just imagine what kind of advice you would give if you received a letter from the past asking for help. ~Ernie Hoyt