I loved this book; I reviewed this one a little differently. Chelsea (from The Suspense is Thrilling Me) and I read this as a buddy read and then had a sort of "book club discussion" where we reviewed it.

I really enjoyed this novel. For me, it was a mix of Law and Order or CSI + thriller/suspense novel + unreliable narrator (think Gone Girl) = Emma in the Night. I honestly didn't know who I could trust and loved that we were left guessing almost until the end.

I found the relationship between Leo and Abby (the FBI investigators) to be somewhat awkward. I didn't like that he called her "kiddo," which seemed to be dismissive and undermining. This was somewhat off-putting to me, but their relationship seemed better towards the end. I only bring this up because I think it would have been preferable to have her male boss respect her as a colleague and peer as opposed to using a belittling (albeit affectionate) phrase to define his younger, female partner.

"...I made a theory for myself about the meaning of life. I decided that life would be about choosing things to make important even though they are not, and cannot ever be. I took this theory and i started to make a list of all the things I would choose to be important and that I would honor. I decided that I would measure myself against my list and whether I had been true to that list of important things."

I loved that we got a lot of character development from Cass during this story. You guess about her motives and her sanity the entire novel, but by the end, you feel like you know her. Cass saves herself and she has come to peace with the fact that she had to do some pretty awful things in order to do that. I like that she is unapologetic and strong. She is one of my favorite recent female protagonists. The story is also told from Abby's point of view, but for me, she took a bit of a backseat role and didn't develop as much. I would like to hear more from her (future book?).

Overall, I rate this 4/5 stars. Emma in the Night is a psychological suspense that will keep you guessing until the end. This book will get a lot of buzz, and it deserves it all. There is a lot to love about this fast read: family drama, an unreliable narrator, and an FBI investigation. I highly recommend this book for suspense/mystery lovers.

This is the story of Cass and Emma, two sisters who went missing three years ago, then one day Cass turns up on her mother's doorstep without Emma, can the authorities find her with the information Cass gives them, is she telling them the truth and will they be able to bring her home where she belongs.

I read Wendy Walkers first book, All is not Forgotten, and really enjoyed it so I was looking forward to reading this one. Whilst I found this one very intriguing and had to find out what had happened to the girls, I enjoyed her first book more.

I would like to thank St Martins Press for inviting me to read this book and will post my review on Goodreads now and on Amazon on publication day.

Cass vanished 3 years ago, along with her older sister Emma. She returns home to a bittersweet reunion as Emma remains missing. At first I compared this story to Elizabeth Smart’s abduction but similarities end early as Cass’s disturbing story begins to unroll. What led up to the fateful night of the girls’ disappearance, why did Cass came home, but not Emma?

Dr. Abby Walker, FBI forensic psychiatrist investigator arrives to interview Cass, gathering clues to help find Emma and the girls’ captors. I liked Abby’s character best, she was patient, kind and expert in her approach dealing with Cass’s trauma. She and Cass form a bond based in part on the personality disorder, pathological narcissism, that both of their mothers have.

Learning about narcissism was enlightening. Walker incorporates the disorder seamlessly into Cass’s mother’s character and the psychological consequences it has on her loved ones. Inserted in the bigger story are background snippets of scheming, seduction and dysfunction. I vacillated between believing and suspecting, continually theorizing. Oh, such lovely twisty-ness!
*will post to other online venues once book is published.

Best book I have read in a while. Thoroughly enjoyed it. Plot was fast paced and gripping

Thank you to St. Martins Press, Wendy Walker and Netgalley for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. My full review has been posted on Goodreads. Such a riveting, suspenseful story...I was glued to the pages and just had to keep reading to know how it would end. Will definitely be reading her first book as soon as I can get my hands on a copy!

I really enjoyed this psychological thriller by Wendy Walker. It is riveting from the beginning and hard to put down. Some complex characters, some I liked and some I did not, especially Mrs. Martin, the narcissistic mother of Emma and Cass, and a very interesting story line that was not predictable at all and that kept me guessing. Although there were a couple of things I did figure out, the ending was a surprise and totally not what I expected. If you enjoy reading books with many twists and turns that will keep you captivated for hours, then definitely read Emma in the Night!

I received an ARC from NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for my honest review.

As with All is Not Forgotten, Walker shows she understands the “psychological” part of psychological thrillers. There were enough twists and turns here to keep me satisfied… and ultimately, surprised by the final turn.

Emma and her younger sister Cass go missing in the middle of the night and 3 years later only one comes back. The beginning of the book has you hooked and you just can't wait to see where it takes you. Unfortunately, it really doesn't take you far. The book had great promise, it just failed to deliver.
You have an extreme case of a narcissistic mom, a simpering fool for a father, a pedophile step-dad and step-brother AND then the FBI woman who also had a narcissistic mother. I would have only given it only 2 stars, but I didn’t see the ending coming. I knew something funky was going on but I didn’t expect what happened.

This is like a 3.5 read. It goes fast, it's not entirely predictable, but it's not entirely unpredictable either. You can kind of figure out bits and pieces but I didn't completely piece together how it all fit.

The choice of narration was kind of odd; narrated in first person by Cass, Emma's sister, and third person following the forensic therapist, Abigail Winter. Cass's first person narration kind of took away from Abby, who you kind of really don't get a chance to know in the brief interludes that follow her part in the investigation. If the story had focused on either woman, it might have been stronger.

I enjoyed this so much more than her previous book, All Is Not Forgotten, which I had DNF'd. There is something that's keeping me from giving this 5 stars, but I did enjoy the ending very much.

I was thankful in receiving this book from NetGalley as I really enjoyed Wendy's previous book "All is not forgotten". I was also seeing alot of rave reviews about this book on Goodreads and had to get on the bandwagon. Not to mention sharing the same name as the main character. Mysteries and Sychological Thrillers and Suspense are my typical go too genres and this one certainly didn't disappoint. So many twist and turns to keep me hooked right up until the end. Great job, thoroughly enjoyable read, highly recommended.

Very interesting read. You have to feel for Cass & Emma as their mother seems bat crap crazy. This reminded me a little of Mommy Dearest without the wire hangers. The story was well told. I didn't really see the end coming. All in all it was a very good read.

3.5stars
This is one of those books that the only thought you get after finishing it is “wow” followed by “holy crap”…

I don’t even know what to say about this… For starters, I had some problems with the writing. I couldn’t really get into it, maybe because it was extremely slow paced and I wasn’t in the mood for that? I’m not sure but after finishing it I just kept thinking that this could have been the best thriller I’ve read until today, and it’s kinda sad I can’t give it 5 stars because in the first 50% of it I felt sometimes bored with the pace. But the end was SO worth it! And made me want to read this book again and see the details I might have missed because I didn’t know where to look.

This had the most surprising ending I’ve ever encountered. I thought I knew what was going on and I discovered that I had absolutely no idea of anything. I started doubting myself, I started doubting the characters and the end blew me away because I just would have never seen that coming.

One thing be told… Most unreliable character award goes to Cass! I can’t even describe this girl. Holy… She is a mess! She is so strong and yet so messed up, it’s scary! The story is told in multiple POV. In Cass’s ones she tells what happened to her while she was gone, every detail, everything she can remember to help the police find Emma that didn’t return with her.

During the book, we learn about Cass, about her life during those years but all over life before them. What was like to live in her house with her family which is completely unfunctional. It’s difficult to choose only one character of this book as the one I hate the most… But I did hate Cass’s mom and at the same time I was intrigued by and wanted to know more about her for how sick she is.

As I said before, I had some problem with the writing. It didn’t feel as gripping as I was expecting it to be, but it was written extremely carefully and with a lot of details that still made you want to know more and read till the end. This was the first book I read from the author and I am totally up for more heavy mystery books like this one.

But the most fascinating part of the book was Cass. I can’t really tell much of the why, but if you like messed up characters and excruciating mysteries this is the book for you! Although the pace was slow, the book was fascinating.

Let me introduce you to a new badass character you're going to love! Cass Tanner from Emma in the Night by Wendy Walker is a deliciously complicated eighteen-year-old girl, who may be working her own angle. 

Three years ago, Emma and Cassandra "Cass" Tanner went missing from a beach in the middle of the night. Three years later,  Cass is back with the tale of a mysterious island and two strangers who have helped them escape their warped life in Connecticut.

The case is headed by FBI Agent Leo Strauss and Dr. Abigail Winter, a forensic psychologist who specialized in narcissistic personality disorder. As Dr. Winter listened to Cassandra's story she begins to see details that quite add up. Slowly Dr. Winter unravels the details of the Tanners home life where lines were crossed and the children were in competition with their elders. But it also makes her realize, that one sister's return may just be the beginning of a crime.



When I finally put Emma in the Night down, I had to take a moment and collection my feelings about what I just read. Wendy Walker has painted a stark and unforgiving portrait of a dysfunctional family in the midst of a crisis through a unique narrative lens where the two points of view we get are an adult Cass and the forensic psychologist. I can't recall ever reading a thriller that's narrated quite like this, and it was intriguing to me, but at times extremely frustrating.

For almost the first half of this book it feels like nothing happens. Which isn't entirely accurate because Emma in the Night relies mostly on memory and a "narrative within a narrative" type structure to convey what happened to Cass and her sister from the night they disappeared until Cassandra's return home. There are time jumps, but in the context of memory, not in a "then and now" story format. 

While it works, it's a different kind of reading, and as I took in the narrative I could see how the pieces would unfold if this was a screenplay.

I didn't hate this method of storytelling, it was just that the way Cassandra broke down her narrative had a distinct stream of consciousness to it, complete with the unrelated tangents that happens when someone is naturally talking. While Cassandra's tangents were related to the story, we're often following three different timelines, and it's a lot to keep straight.

As much as I sometimes wanted to scream "what does this have to do with anything," I did enjoy the novel.

I was engaged in Cass's story, and I was engaged with Dr. Abigail Winter's perceptions of the family, but unlike some thrillers Emma in the Night does require me to surrender to one character's recounting of what happened.

One thing that I found really refreshing about Emma in the Night was the way Abby was constructed. One thing that I find lags in mysteries is that the law enforcement officers often assigned to cases have a clinical detachment that makes that is only useful for dreaded info dumps. (Some examples of this are in The Couple Next Door by Shari Lapena and Everything You Want Me to Be by Mindy Mejia.)

Abby feels like a whole person, with a past all her own. While it isn't Abby's story, we get the sense that she has just as much riding on this as the reader.

Abby has a connection to the case, and a history with narcissism that colors her perceptions. It also makes her a compelling lens, and I wanted to read her chapters. If I slowed down with Abby's chapters at all, it was because I was trying to piece together the narrative as a whole since there was some overlap in what Cass was narration and what Abby was processing.

I won't lie, the constant ruminating over certain memories, where I didn't get a lot of new information for several pages, did make it hard for me to get into the book for short periods of time. However, once I was with the characters I didn't want to put the book down. Fortunately, all of that frustration and agitation paid off with a spectacular ending.

If you have the pages for a slow burn psychological thriller then I think Emma in the Night is the book you'll want to read this summer.

My only question: who is going to direct the movie adaptation of this portrait of a crazy family?

Suspenseful! The author kept the tension finely strung throughout the entire book, never slacking, right up to the end. The plot twists kept me guessing. The book also finished on a good note - although there are terrible people in the world, not all of them are - which can be rare for psychological thrillers. I enjoyed the scientific aspect of the behavior of the characters as well.

“Emma in the Night” by Wendy Walker is a suspenseful thriller that will keep readers guessing. Two sisters, Emma and Cassandra just disappear one day. No one knows where they have gone or why, not even the FBI. Three years later, Cass just shows up at her mother’s house, unannounced and by herself, no Emma. Where has she been and what happened to Emma? The details slowly emerge, and the truth is revealed.
The book is written from two main points of view, that of Cass, and that of Dr. Abigail Winter, the FBI forensic psychiatrist who investigated the disappearance of the two girls and is back to continue the investigation. The action is dialogue driven, and individual chapters are identified by character to help readers keep track of the viewpoint.
The main characters are well developed, and the alternating chapters enable them to each express their own voice and viewpoint. Supporting characters, seen through the perspectives of Cass and Dr. Winter, are dysfunctional, controlling, and narcissistic; none is likeable.

I received a copy of “Emma in the Night” from St Martin’s Press, Wendy Walker, and NetGalley. It is a disturbing, twisted, and yet captivating thriller that will keep readers guessing all the way through. I enjoyed reading it and was satisfied with the ending

I really, really enjoyed this book. I have to say I was a bit concerned that I wouldn’t like the alternating point of view aspect between Dr. Abby White and Cass, but I actually really loved it. It was interesting in a plot such as this to get to hear from both sides. The book is told in the present when Cass returns home after being missing for 3 years, but Cass very often tells stories from the past, both before her disappearance and what happened while she was missing, to fill in the gaps. The family dynamics in this book are amazingly disturbing, the way the mother and step-father treat the children and the games the children play with the adults. Cass calls her mother Mrs. Martin through most of the book which just gives you an idea bout how she feels about her mother. The dynamics between the parents, Emma and Cass and their step-brother Hunter, are complicated to say the least. Dr. Abby White was originally on the case when the girls went missing and had some theories that her colleagues dismissed, leaving her slightly obsessed with the case. When Cass shows back up, Abby jumps back into the investigation and ends up uncovering a great deal of secrets that the family has been keeping.

There were several plot twists in this book that I didn’t see coming and I was very impressed with those twists, as well as the way the book ended. I was afraid that hearing from Dr. Abby White’s perspective might sound clinical, but it didn’t at all and I really enjoyed hearing from her character as well, especially towards the end of the book when she starts figuring a few things out. Cass is a complicated character and it’s hard for me to fully explain without giving away any spoilers, but I also really enjoyed her character and what she has gone through. I liked the way she explained things; the way she describes people, relationships and emotions. We learn a lot about Emma, their mother Mrs. Martin, Jonathon, their step-father and their step-brother, Hunter, throughout the book as well. I felt like we got to know Emma fairly well through Cass’s retelling of stories from their past.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book; the plot twists, the author’s writing, the characters and the split perspective between Cass and Dr. Abby White. I look forward to reading more by the author in the future. Thank you to the publisher, St. Martin’s Press, for sending me an ARC of this book.

I was eager to read this book after All is Not Forgotten by the author was such a page-turner. Emma in the Night shared the suspenseful quality and I think the way the tense atmosphere was building in this book was even more powerful. The story is told from different points of view, which I generally enjoy and was done well here. While this is not necessarily the most memorable story, it was definitely gripping and I would recommend it to all fans of psychological suspense!