Thank you very much for the opportunity to read this book early! I really enjoyed it. I thought the writing was very well done, and the story kept me interested. I believe my students/patrons would also love this book and will be acquiring it for the library!

Iris Yamashita’s City Under One Roof, a debut mystery, introduced an Alaskan city, Point Mettier, that houses 205 residents all in one building. Two of the women featured in that book return in leading roles in Village in the Dark.

Cara Kennedy was a detective with the Anchorage Police Department until the disappearance of her husband, Aaron and son, Dylan. After searching for them, and burying the bodies, she failed her psych evaluation, and was placed on disability. New evidence indicates those bodies might not have been her son and husband. She has the bodies exhumed, only to learn the DNA is not theirs. Where are Aaron and Dylan?

Ellie Wright is the owner of Cozy Condo Inn in Point Mettier. She chose to live in Point Mettier to protect herself from her husband, who was in prison. But, when Ellie’s son, Timothy, is found dead in his apartment, she handles the funeral. She’s shocked when her husband shows up.

Mia Upash is a waitress working in a diner in Willow, Alaska. But, the half-Japanese, half-white young woman has changed her name several times, and moved around. She’s uneasy enough to feel it’s time to return to her home village, Unity. The isolated villaged is a refuge for women who suffered from sexual assault and oppression. Mia’s Japanese mother brought her there when she was young, but she wanted to experience life in the outside world.

All three women are brought together by search for answers, violent answers that are driven by greed and outside entities. They’ll need the help of other strong people who sought shelter in Alaska.

Village in the Dark is another compelling story set in an isolated region. The isolation, and the people who survive in it, are fascinating. In this book, Yamashita adds stories of women who suffered from abuse in the worst state for violent crime against women. In this case, the women fight back.

I eagerly devoured the preceding adventure of Detective Cara Kennedy in "City Under One Roof," and my anticipation for this sequel had been building since the spine-tingling cliffhanger that hinted at a possible connection between the deaths of Cara's husband and son and the departed gang member, Michael Lovansky. Why would a notorious gang member, whom she had never encountered, possess a family photo featuring her alongside random individuals?

Before delving into the sequel and unveiling the resolution to the central enigma, let's recap the journey thus far: Cara Kennedy, an aspiring detective at the Anchorage Police Department, grappled with the profound loss of her husband Aaron, a manager at a pharmatech company's research division, and her six-year-old son Dylan, whose remains were tragically discovered in the Talkeetna wilderness. Her focus turned to cases involving missing persons and dismembered body parts, which included a series of extremities washing ashore along the Pacific Northwest and Canadian coastlines. This pursuit led her to the enigmatic enclave of Point Mettier—a remote city accessed through a constricting tunnel—where its 205 inhabitants inhabited a single towering condominium. Remarkably, Cara untangled the web of a seemingly unrelated murder, a resolution independent of her own personal losses.

Within this cityscape, she successfully resolved a gang-related crime, securing a second chance at love with Officer J. B., someone whose existence teetered on the brink during a gang altercation.

However, tethered by an inexplicable link to her past, Cara's curiosity crystallizes when she stumbles upon Ellie, the manager of Point Meittier, who too shares a connection to those photographs. Ellie's son, recently lost to an overdose, is among the figures in those images, prompting an unlikely alliance born of shared grief. Their partnership as grieving mothers embarks on a quest for the truth.

Cara's investigations unearth a startling revelation—individuals within those photographs are either deceased or missing. Among them is Mia Upash, whose trail leads Cara to Unity, an insular village. Unity houses women and children who have retreated from the clutches of abusive men, dwelling by their own code and subsisting through hunting, fishing, and embracing the bounties of nature. Mia's departure from the sanctuary to the world beyond, driven by love, thrusts her into peril, casting her into a cabin hidden within the woods. Could Mia's journey hold the answers to the myriad missing and deceased individuals?

Cara's relentless pursuit uncovers yet another seismic revelation, setting her on a perilous trajectory—one that may ensnare not only herself but also her compatriot in crime, J. B.

The second installment in this series proved to be a fast-paced, heart-pounding page-turner that held me captive, making it virtually impossible to relinquish. My return to Point Meittier offered the delight of further immersion into the lives of its distinctive, resilient, and singular characters. The gratifying culmination of their narratives, devoid of any loose ends, is the cherry atop this literary endeavor.

Deserving of my esteemed five stars, I wholeheartedly recommend indulging in both volumes of this series. My heartfelt gratitude extends to NetGalley and Berkley Publishing for generously granting me access to the digital advance copy of this intellectually riveting and exceptional work, in exchange for my candid insights.