Ruud Pujasumarta has seen some gang-perpetrated horror crimes in his time, but the slum murder of a middle-aged woman he is called to is both horrifying and baffling. Mari Agnes Liem has not only been choked to death while tied to her bed, but the murderer has amputated her left hand and left a mah jong tile in her throat. And he has taken the hand with him.

Ruud’s personal life is a disaster - the whole world seems to know that his wife has left him for another man, perhaps because his (ex) mother-in-law keeps on turning up at his office with food for him. The only bright spot on Ruud’s horizon is the imminent arrival of Imke Sneijder from Amsterdam, whom he hasn’t seen for fifteen years, when they were both twelve-year-old neighbours before her family moved back to Holland.

As Ruud and his department investigate the crime and the others that follow, he begins to realise that the current murderous spree may be linked to events which occured fifteen years ago, at about the time Imke left Indonesia…