In her debut thriller, ALL IS NOT FORGOTTEN, Wendy Walker looked deep into the intricacies of family and community secrets and lies. In her second novel, EMMA IN THE NIGHT, she takes that kind of investigation to a whole new level, featuring two points of view, neither of which may be entirely trustworthy.

The book opens three years after the Tanner sisters --- 15-year-old Cass and 17-year-old Emma --- disappeared from their suburban Connecticut neighborhood. After everyone had given them up for dead, Cass, now 18, arrives back at her mother’s doorstep…but Emma is nowhere in sight.

Once Cass, who appears to be more or less physically and emotionally unscathed, feels ready to tell her story, the authorities call in Dr. Abigail Winter, a forensic psychologist who was originally assigned to the Tanner case and has never been entirely able to let the family --- or her suspicions about them --- go.

"Walker does spell out the truth near the end of the book, but not in a way that insults her readers' intelligence. Rather, the revelations that unfurl in the conclusion continue to both surprise and satisfy."

The Tanner girls’ mother, Judy, now known by her second husband’s last name, Martin, bears a lot of resemblance to Abby’s own deeply damaged --- and damaging --- mother. Both women suffered from narcissistic personality disorder, a little-known and less well-understood condition that goes way beyond the self-centeredness we usually mean when we call someone a narcissist. The kinds of chronic behaviors exhibited by Judy (who Cass, tellingly, thinks of only as Mrs. Martin) damage relationships, pit sisters against one another, and result in nearly unimaginable levels of family dysfunction and betrayal. Abby lived through that dynamic, and has always suspected that it also lay behind Cass and Emma’s disappearance --- that something more personal than a stranger abduction or runaway was at the core of the mystery.

Cass’ story is harrowing, thorough and convincing --- at least at first. But, Abby wonders, is it perhaps a little too practiced, a little too rehearsed? After all, Cass has had three years to craft and perfect her story. But if she’s lying, who is she protecting, and what does she still need to hide? And where, after all, is Emma, and why does Cass’ story seem to lead no closer to finding her older sister, supposedly alive and (more or less) well on an unidentified island off the coast of Maine?

Walker’s narrative unspools gradually, alternating viewpoints between Abby and Cass, and between past and present. Knowing who to trust becomes increasingly complicated, and sooner or later readers will begin to question just about everything. The novel may churn along slowly, but the psychological suspense steadily grows, as readers find themselves with very little sure footing on which to stand. Fortunately, Walker does spell out the truth near the end of the book, but not in a way that insults her readers' intelligence. Rather, the revelations that unfurl in the conclusion continue to both surprise and satisfy.