A young immigrant in Sweden, Rinai, has been detained for her husband's murder on their farm. She's apparently exonerated, however, when two Americans discover a second victim killed in the same horrific fashion after Rinai's detention. The Americans then arrange to bring Rinai to their psychiatric clinic for treatment of her trauma. When they revisit the farm for material, however, one of them is murdered by a grotesque figure.

The surviving therapist, who narrates the story, is accompanied by a policewoman, Astrid, in bringing Rinai to the Center for Integrative Treatment of Extreme Dysfunction. A man sitting behind Rinai on the plane dies from a mysterious seizure. Astrid must return to Sweden, but she assists the narrator later when he returns there himself for the trial of his colleague's alleged murderer. While in America, he is assisted by his clinic's technical expert, Midori, whose findings cast doubt on Rinai's innocence. Several murders occur around the Center following the widow's admittance.

The narrator, with his background in anthropology, visits Rinai's original home near Indonesia. He studies her origin and the strange beliefs and practices she described, then comes to recognize a prodigious threat to humanity that requires drastic resolution.