Meitantei Marnie, or Marnie is a mystery manga by Kigitsu Katsuhisa. A high school detective girl who's earning some petty cash for detective work, or in most cases, socially pressured into it by her good friend, Yurika, or just the random authority interested in finding out more about their troubles.
Where there are people, there is drama and troubles to be solved. Marnie's father works as a detective to solve problems created between people, whether they are marriage issues or murder cases. Just like her father, Marnie also solves cases as long as the price is right. She usually lives as a normal student, sleeping through her classes, but once a client asks for her help, she will stop at nothing to solve the mystery laid before her.
A mostly episodic series, the manga was serialized in Akita Shoten's Weekly Shōnen Champion, and ran from Aug 16, 2012 to Aug 7, 2014, with 99 chapters.
This series provides examples of:
- The Casanova: Mochizuki has a lot of followers revolving around him. His stalker was able to sneak into the crowd to find evidence of his recordings.
- Contemplate Our Navels: Marnie goes into her head when thinking of how to investigate a crime. This being an episodic series, she wraps up the conclusion for the big reveal at the end of the chapter.
- Continuity Nod: Characters introduced in previous chapters often reappear, usually when they've been named and/or directly connected to Marnie.
- Corrupt Politician: The client in Chapter 8 is involved in a lot of underhanded dealings, resulting in his isolation behind thick security and attention to secrecy.
- Dead Man Writing: In Chapter 2, Nachi-senpai receives this from his friend Yuji when the latter abruptly dies in the form of a video game character.
- In Chapter 8, The last letter acknowledges the client as being like a father to him.
- Doppelgänger: In Chapter 3, a former client contacts Lloyd because she fears there was a clone of her.
- Education Mama: Inverted in Chapter 41. Kareno's old friend is the son of celebrities who want him to become one as well, to the point where getting him involved in the celebrity lifestyle has started interfering with his grades, which they explicitly don't care about. It's gotten to the point where he and Kareno (whose grades have also been slipping) meet at a hotel to study in secret.
- I Have Your Wife: In Chapter 1, a child was abducted from a local park. While the author reduces the burden by revealing that the kidnapper had no ill intentions, the fear caused by her actions are real.
- Head Pet: Marnie's cat Elliot is fond of riding on her head.
- Hypocritical Humor: The client of Chapter 8 pretends to have a family and strong moral values despite his role as a Sleazy Politician. In the end, the missing person has a large family, and props him up in his lies, leaving him unable to discover the truth.
- Justified Criminal: In Chapter 5, Kaneo steals to give gifts for his old folks.
- In Chapter 6, an unknown stalker intrudes into Mochizuki's home to find evidence of his serial crimes.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Usually either happens to Marnie (when pushing away responsibility) or the criminal.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: A parody of Michael Jackson and his fan club appears in Chapter 40.
- Otaku: In Chapter 4, Yurika asks Marnie to investigate a fateful encounter at a wedding. It turns out that he's a funeral fanatic. Marnie attributes her difficulty to Yurika hiding that she's a wedding fanatic who invites herself into ceremonies as well.
- Replacement Goldfish: Defied in Chapter 12. While playing with Lloyd helps Miyako start talking again, not only does she understand that her grandfather is gone, but there were subtle differences in the way he treated her. Miyako asks Lloyd not to return.
- Retirony: In Chapter 36, the mysterious woman appearing at graveyards to pull a marriage scam by targeting widowers meets Kataoka the day she goes to her first husband's grave to tell him that she intends to stop pulling her scams and live happily with her current soon-to-be husband. Naturally, Marnie's involvement means she ends up getting caught.
- Sexbot: In Chapter 3, a former stalker recreates his obsession. It eventually leads to his death.
- Take That!: Is it necessary to install cameras to look over your child, when intruding into the privacy of a bathroom?
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: Rather than outright wrong, several criminals believe that their passion outweighs the consequences of their crime.
