Book Review | The Kamogawa Food Detectives

Hello and welcome to my book review of The Kamogawa Food Detectives. This is a brilliant cosy read which I would highly recommend during the colder winter months.

The Kamogawa Food Detectives, translated from Japanese by Jesse Kirkwood, is the first book in the bestselling, mouth-watering Japanese sleuthing series for fans of Before the Coffee Gets Cold.

What’s the one dish you’d do anything to taste just one more time?

Down a quiet backstreet in Kyoto exists a very special restaurant. Run by Koishi Kamogawa and her father Nagare, the Kamogawa Diner treats its customers to wonderfully extravagant meals. But that’s not the main reason to stop by . . .

The father-daughter duo have started advertising their services as ‘food detectives’. Through ingenious investigations, they are capable of recreating a dish from their customers’ pasts – dishes that may well hold the keys to unlocking forgotten memories and future happiness.

From the widower looking for a specific noodle dish that his wife used to cook, to a first love’s beef stew, the restaurant of lost recipes provides a link to the past – and a way to a more contented future.

A bestseller in Japan, The Kamogawa Food Detectives by Hisashi Kashiwai is a celebration of good company and the power of a delicious meal.

Huge thank you to Pan Macmillan for kindly sending me a copy of The Kamogawa Food Detectives to read and review.

As soon as I read the description of this novel I knew I was entirely hooked. A father-daughter detective agency that can recreate patron’s favourite or other memorable dishes sounded like the cutest most heart-warming read!

This novel is exactly this. It is so so cosy and heart-warming, every page is filled with such warmth and love, it radiates off every page. You are welcomed into the restaurant with as much cheer as the patrons themselves, and I would have happily stayed in the restaurant for 100s of books.

I would recommend that you don’t read this book while hungry, as it will do nothing but exacerbate that hunger!! All the descriptions of dishes and ingredients will make your mouth water and your stomach crave some Japanese food. I wanted a bowl of udon noodles as soon as I put the book down.

The characters are all brilliantly written, and the father-daughter duo work perfectly. It was so fun getting to know all the different characters that visited the restaurant, they were all different and looking for different things. I really liked all the interactions in the novel, and getting to know the main characters a little more with every chapter.

The author has very cleverly separated the novel into chapters based on each character. So we get the full story of a character in a chapter. It makes the novel read in lovely manageable chunks, and it’s very much a novel you could pick up and put down after reading a chapter or two.

Overall I really loved this novel, it was such a lovely heart-warming read, packed full of the most delicious sounding food! It’s perfect for fans of Before The Coffee Gets Cold. Huge thank you to Pan Macmillan for sending me a proof copy.

Thank you for reading my book review of The Kamogawa Food Detectives.

Buy the book from Waterstones or Bookshop.org (both affiliate links)

• 
• 
• 
•