The Shell Part III: Paradiso

It is January 1958 in Showa-era Japan. At a funeral held in gray snow, the portrait of a young girl looks almost embarrassed and a little lonely. The imprisoned painter Shinzo Mamiya died weeks after the Blessed Congregation's crimes came to light. Detective Reiji Tokisaka arrives to help sort through the man's belongings and instead discovers an unknown work in the studio: a one-winged, armless angel called Exile of Paradise — as beautiful as it is sinister, and resembling Mamiya's infamous masterpiece Girl in Shell. Days later, a woman's body is found posed exactly as the painting depicts. Part III of The Shell mystery series.