Popular Japanese Novelist Keigo Higashino Dies at 68

Tokyo, July 27 (Jiji Press)--Popular Japanese author Keigo Higashino, known for his mystery novels, died of colorectal cancer in the early hours of Thursday. He was 68.

Higashino, a native of the western prefecture of Osaka, published his first novel, "Hokago" (After-School Hours) in 1985, while working as an engineer after graduating from Osaka Prefecture University, a predecessor of Osaka Metropolitan University. The book won the Edogawa Ranpo Prize that year.

In 1999, he won the Mystery Writers of Japan Award for "Himitsu," also published in English under the title "Naoko."

His "Yogisha X no Kenshin" (The Devotion of Suspect X), a work in his Detective Galileo series featuring a genius physicist, won the Naoki Prize in 2006.

Higashino became a best-selling author with a number of his mystery novels that combined gripping character-driven drama and brilliant mystery-solving. He established himself as a popular novelist whose works were adapted into movies and dramas, including the Detective Galileo series.

[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]