Strange Pictures

A Novel

A SPOTIFY BEST MYSTERY AUDIOBOOK OF 2025

“Uketsu is a disrupter, the master of quiet horror.”—Janice Hallett, internationally bestselling author of The Appeal

“Delightfully macabre and fiendishly clever. Seemingly unconnected stories tie themselves into a complicated knot, which Uketsu masterfully unravels.”—G. T. Karber, author of the national bestseller Murdle

The spine-tingling "triumphant international debut" (Publishers Weekly starred review) that has taken Japan by storm—an eerie fresh take on mystery-horror in which a series of seemingly innocent pictures draws you into a disturbing web of unsolved mysteries and shattered psyches.

An exploration of the macabre, where the seemingly mundane takes on a terrifying significance. . . .

A pregnant woman's sketches on a seemingly innocuous blog conceal a chilling warning.

A child's picture of his home contains a dark secret message.

A sketch made by a murder victim in his final moments leads an amateur sleuth down a rabbithole that will reveal a horrifying reality.

Structured around these nine childlike drawings, each holding a disturbing clue, Uketsu invites readers to piece together the mystery behind each and the over-arching backstory that connects them all. Strange Pictures is the internationally bestselling debut from mystery horror YouTube sensation Uketsu—an enigmatic masked figure who has become one of Japan's most talked about contemporary authors.

Translated from the Japanese by Jim Rion.

Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.

It actually works as an audiobook

It is useful to have a hardcopy or the digital copy so that you can look at the pictures, but it makes for a fascinating read nonetheless.

Pretty Cool Concept

I really enjoyed the concept of this book, being able to see the drawigs that are analyzed and trying to figure out the puzzle on my own was pretty cool.

Trying to figure out how everything relates to one another was confusing at first but as you get towards the middle of the story, you start to get how it all relates to one another.

Clever mystery

Right when you think you e figured it out, no you haven’t. Not at all. Such a great and entertaining read. Japanese know how to write mysteries.

For the faint of heart.

Let me preface this by saying that I have no idea who this YouTuber is. I know nothing about them. I was looking for creepy books and this was a new release. I like to go into things blind so I didn't know this was written by a YouTuber until after I purchased it.

There really isn't anything interesting about this book but it also doesn't deserve a 1 star review. Either the translator did a mediocre job or the book was written for middle schoolers.

The person reading the book wasn't for me. I didn't like his voice acting and he couldn't pronounce the word "crayon" correctly.

Great Story!

I really enjoyed this book. I can’t wait to read more of his books. I already read Strange Buildings and it was really good too.