'Kanae Minato is a brilliant storyteller' Emily St John Mandel, author of Station Eleven

When a group of young girls are approached by a stranger, they cannot know that the encounter will haunt them for the rest of their lives.

Hours later, Emily is dead. The surviving girls alone can identify the killer. But not one of them remembers his face...

Driven mad by grief, the victim's mother demands the girls find the murderer or else atone for their crimes. If they do neither, she will have her revenge. She will make them pay...

From the critically acclaimed author of Confessions, Penance is a dark and disturbing tale of revenge that will leave you reeling.

"Praise for CONFESSIONS" - .

"Think of CONFESSIONS as the Gone Girl of Japan....[A] gut-wrenching thrill ride...its thrust should hit home for any reader with a pulse." - Los Angeles Times

"Explosive... A dark thriller about love, despair and murder" - Irish Tatler

"A creepy and mesmerizing psychological thriller that challenges the conventions of right vs. wrong, good vs. evil, and law vs. justice." - Library Journal

"A spellbinding read, a fascinating peek into modern Japanese society, and a glimpse into the dark corners of the human psyche" - Booklist