In Jakarta, Indonesia, the city is edgy after the fall of president Soeharto, the country engulfed in religious strife and urban violence. Most westerners have fled, but rootless, disenchanted Graham Young has decided to stay. After a skin-crawling encounter in the Hotel Platinum, Graham gets caught up in Detective Suprianto's investigation of a rash of mysterious sex killings. As Jakarta closes in, Graham becomes further alienated from the sterile comforts of ex-pat life—neither East nor West offers solace. With terror everywhere, Graham sidesteps sinister forces and slides from one bizarre locale to another—from a glitzy mall buzzing with the would-be rich to the Moonbeam for pool games with "butterflies of the night." Add to that a thumbprint in blood and malevolent interrogation and his paranoia begins to reach almost unbearable levels. Around every corner there seems to loom the shadows of treachery and unspoken guilt.