People who eat darkness: by Richard Parry 439 pages 9780374230593

Red hot hell is where the villain in this true crime novel deserves to go. The ridiculously long subtitle says it all:  the true story of a young woman who vanished from the streets of Tokyo and the evil that swallowed her up. Lucie Blackman left her English home with her best friend to earn easy money as a "hostess" in Tokyo. Disappear she did, and this relates the slow-moving search for her and the lengthy trial to bring the suspect, Joji Obara to justice. Joji channels the evil of Richard Speck and other famous American serial murderers. Somehow I never heard of this criminal, perhaps  because he was from Japan or flew under media radar. I generally do not read this genre, but I read a positive review of this and found it totally compelling.