Yamada Monogatari: Troubled Spirits / Richard Parks. Canemill Publishing, 2022 (paperback, ebook). 147 pages.

This small collection is a fitting conclusion to Richard Park’s historical fantasy mystery series Yamada Monogatari (literally “The Story of Yamada”), set in Heian period Japan. The protagonist, Yamada no Goji, is a fallen nobleman who, under the patronage of Prince Kanemore and aided by his sidekick, the rogue Buddhist priest Kenji, plies his hand-to-mouth trade as a hard-bitten private investigator of supernatural mysteries. In the course of the series his fortunes gradually reverse, and the present book finds him restored to the favor of the imperial court, a landowner and head of his own clan.

Previous entries in the series were Yamada Monogatari: Demon Hunter (collection, 2013), Yamada Monogatari: To Break the Demon Gate (novel, 2014), Yamada Monogatari: The War God’s Son (novel, 2016), and Yamada Monogatari: The Emperor in Shadow (novel, 2016), all published by Prime Books. Troubled Spirits, self-published by the author himself, collects the remaining Yamada short stories, two of them previously unpublished. Some are set before and some after The Emperor in Shadow. Though Parks has not definitively ruled out writing more stories, the collection has an air of finality.

Some of the tales are as adventurous as any that came before; others are mere anecdotes, wistful in quality, particularly the two new ones. I find these added stories a bit disappointing in their brevity, but welcome for the additional glimpses they provide of the protagonist and his family. Taken together with the other stories, they give an impression of fade-out; Yamada is now well-settled and less inclined to seek out mystery and peril—and perhaps a little bored in consequence, even if the supernatural continues to impinge occasionally, and in one instance dangerously, on his affairs.

“The Tiger’s Turn” and “A Minor Exorcism” (which proves anything but) are as exciting as anyone could wish, while “The Ame Onna” and “One Rainy Day, With Spirits” counterpoint them as brief, contemplative sketches. The other stories fall in between. “The Sorrow of Rain” and “Three Little Foxes” hinge on misunderstandings between the physical and spiritual worlds that must be disentangled and mediated for all to be made well with both. In “Uzumaki of the Lake” the spiritual provides a warning against human foolishness — fortunately heeded, if just in time. In “The Fox’s Daughter” the conflict between the worlds is rife with unintentional (or perhaps very intentional) comedy—witness the titular character’s dangerous “doggy.”

Despite a bump or two in the road (admittedly, some of them big ones), Yamada seems increasingly content with his existence as the sequence proceeds. While I would welcome more (and meatier) tales in this series, I would hate for them to come at the expense of his new-found peace. This is a wonderful note to depart on, with moments both consequential and minor, a few reappearances of old friends, and, as always, our hero doing his best to do his duty and the right thing, and puzzling out where the balance should lie, when unsure.

I enjoyed this book!

Four out of five stars.

—Brian.