The Man Who Died Seven Times [1995/2025] – ★★★

Who doesn’t like a time-loop in their fantasy story? The idea that one can go back to the past and relive it, changing it or gaining particular insight from it is irresistible for fiction lovers. In novels The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August by Claire North and Replay by Ken Grimwood, there are people who have a chance to relive their lives, and such films as Back to the Future and Groundhog Day popularised the concept of time-travel/loop in action and romantic comedies. Of course, the most famous example of a time-loop in detective fiction now is Stuart Turton’s The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, and in Japanese fiction – probably still a light novel by Hiroshi Sakurazaka titled All You Need Is Kill (later Hollywood film Edge of Tomorrow). Since Nishizawa’s book of 1995 predates Sakurazaka’s light novel of 2004, it was one of the first in Japan to break into the market with the theme, and the idea of mixing sci-fi time-loops and a detective mystery. Now, it is published for the first time in English under the title The Man Who Died Seven Times, translated by Jesse Kirkwood.

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