Southwestern Sweden is the site of an increasingly frantic hunt for Grendel, a psychopathic murderer the media will dub "the cannibal killer." Thirty-year veteran, quirky, overweight Chief Superintendent Walther Ekman, has a difficult choice when he gets a boastful letter from the self-proclaimed cannibal: he can ignore it as a hoax or set about finding him. His intuition tells him there have been multiple murders, even though no bodies have been found. His friend, psychiatrist Jarl Karlsson, helps his build a profile of a brilliant, homicidal sociopath, and warns Ekman that the killer is focused on him. As the push to find the killer accelerates, headline-seeking newspaperman Bruno Haeggman launches a public vendetta against Ekman that can shatter his reputation. Compelled by political pressure to call on Superintendent Garth Rystrom of the National CID for help, Ekman senses the investigation is spinning out of control.