[1][2] In 1991, at a youth camp run by the Norwegian Salvation Army, the 14-year-old daughter of a senior Salvationist official is raped in a public toilet.

Because of the Salvation Army's strict hierarchical setup, and because public knowledge of the rape will severely damage the organisation's reputation, she does not tell anyone about the ordeal.

In the present day (2003), the assassin — calling himself Stankić — arrives in Oslo and kills a Salvation Army officer, Robert Karlsen, during a Christmas street concert.

Meanwhile, retiring Oslo police inspector Bjarne Møller gives his three main officers — Jack Halvorsen, Beate Lønn and Harry Hole — gifts.

He makes a deal with her to save her son's life, but upon returning to Norway discovers that a man wearing Stankić's clothes has been shot and killed by a police marksman.

Owing to the high valuation that an antique dealer puts on the watch given to him by Møller, Hole also realises that his former boss was involved in the same group of corrupt police officers as his former nemesis, Tom Waaler.

As with previous Harry Hole novels by Jo Nesbø, the book - called Frelseren in Norwegian - was translated into English by Don Bartlett.