The People Who Eat Darkness by Richard Parry

Synopsis:
Subtitled: The True Story of a Young Woman [Lucie Blackman] Who Vanished from the Streets of Tokyo–and the Evil That Swallowed Her Up.

Review:
I have no idea what the title of The People Who Eat Darkness means, but that was the only thing I found unsatisfying about this riveting true crime read. Lucie Blackman was a British girl who went to Tokyo to pay off her debts working as a hostess, a paid entertainer to Japanese salarymen. She was not a prostitute or an escort or a stripper, but her job put her on the continuum of Japan’s sex trade and ultimately exposed her to the evil that destroyed her. I don’t want to give away anything of what happened to Lucie, because the storytelling is so masterful, so I will just say that I was thoroughly freaked out and couldn’t put it down.