In an unnamed country in Northern Europe, it is a crime to be inebriated even in your own home, and the city centers have been paved over with gleaming new roads. Chief Inspector Jensen, abroad for a liver transplant, has been called home—but now no flights are returning to his country, and no broadcasts are coming out. No one will even answer the phone. In this 1968 thriller from the co-creator of the Martin Beck novels, Jensen finds an epidemic has ravaged his homeland, and he may be the only one who can save it.