Breath-taking drawing

THE QUEST FOR THE MISSING GIRL

Story and art: Jiro Taniguchi

Publisher: Fanfare/Ponent Mon; 334 pages

(ISBN: 978-8496427471)

For ages 18+

JAPANESE mangaka Jiro Taniguchi is very popular in Europe, maybe more so than in his home country. French scholar Brigitte Koyama-Richard of Japan’s Musashi University raves about his works, calling them “a fusion of Western graphics with manga” in her book, One Thousand Years of Manga.

This reviewer recently encountered The Quest for the Missing Girl, which is the English translation of Taniguchi’s 1999 Japanese release, Sosakusha (The Investigator). Despite the 10-year gap, the story about teenagers mingling in Shibuya, Tokyo, is still vivid, fresh and exciting.

Middle-aged mountain climber Shiga works at a mountain refuge in Yamanashi Prefecture. He goes to Tokyo to find Megumi, the missing daughter of his late friend. The manga is about the several days of Shiga’s search for the middle-school-aged girl as he tries to understand why the straight-A student disappeared suddenly in Shibuya – a magnet for teenagers who want to hang out or make fast money as freelance prostitutes.

Megumi’s mother, the beautiful widow of Shiga’s friend, asks Shiga for help, and Shiga embarks on a bewildering search in Japan’s busiest area.

Shiga manages to track down Megumi’s whereabouts thanks to his persistent questioning, which borders on reckless but beats the official police investigation, and his luck in meeting a reliable man named Yoshio – an unofficial social worker who has earned the trust of the “Shibuya Girls” in the Center-gai district.

The calls that Shiga makes from phone booths, and the messages written in Yoshio’s scrapbook that help the Shibuya girls keep in touch suggest that the story was written in the very last moments of a world without ubiquitous mobile phones.

Detailed observations of the popular district are reflected in Taniguchi’s drawing, making it possible for readers to guess where the characters are in Shibuya. His graphic drawing style and the grey, half-toned urban backgrounds also give an authentic flavour to the story.

Though the story is about Megumi’s whereabouts and her reasons for running away from home, there are answers to other questions the reader will be eager to know: What was the point of making Shiga a mountaineer? Why is Shiga so desperate in his search, despite Megumi not being his actual daughter?

The answer to the first question comes during the climax in an unexpected and far-fetched way that totally changes the comic’s genre. The vivid drawing and sober style maintain the quality of the story, making this hard-to-believe climax plausible.

As for the second question, Taniguchi leaves the answer open to interpretation, so that Shiga is portrayed as the ideal Japanese man – quiet but dependable.

The Quest for the Missing Girl contains contemporary ideology and social caricatures. But the likely key to its appeal is the detailed description of scenery, from landscapes to coffee cup shadows, and the dramatic angles that look as if they are movie stills.

This is true artwork that allows readers to enjoy the exciting story, with depictions of Japanese subcultures and painstaking drawings in every frame. – The Daily Yomiuri / Asia News Network