A lonely old man is found dead in his bed, probably suffocated under his pillow. In his drawers, press clippings about the discovery of the body of a young seamstress in the Shadows Passage in 1944, during the American occupation. Why has this old crime resurfaced? Did the police arrest an innocent man? Sixty years later, ex-inspector Konrad leads a double investigation. Erlendur's literary twin, he grew up in the city, in the notorious Shadows district, with a con man father, a real brute and a fake spiritualist. He discovers that the Iceland of the "situation" is not kind to young girls, deceived, abused, abandoned, who are sometimes told, once the affair is over, "you'll say it was the elves."
A gripping thriller that brilliantly blends two eras and two investigations in a dizzying game of mirrors.