A story of obsession and murder that transcends time – and place
1528. A young Franciscan monk travels to Norway to collect a set of scalpels from a barber surgeon with whom he shares a dark obsession: the dissection of human corpses. The monk’s deadly legacy is a mysterious manuscript, the Book of John – bound in human skin.
Nearly five hundred years later, it seems that the shocking and ancient practice of flaying is experiencing a revival . . .
2010. Trondheim, Norway. Inspector Odd Singsaker is leading the investigation into the death of Gunn Brita Dahle, a university librarian who was brutally flayed – and the theft of the priceless Book of John. The prime suspect is a security guard at the library, who was once an academic high-flyer but now lives an isolated existence following the unexplained disappearance of his wife and son some years back.
2010. Richmond, Virginia. When the curator of the Edgar Allan Poe museum suffers the same fate as Dahle, US Detective Felicia Stone flies to Norway to join Singsaker in the hunt for a serial killer. The more they delve into the past, the more sinister their discoveries become . . .
The key to the psychopath’s next move is held within the manuscript. But can they track it down and work out the clues before another person has to die?