Sweden, early 20th century: The young, impoverished Hanna, as the eldest of five siblings, must leave her homeland and arrives in the Portuguese colony of Mozambique. There, she will inherit a fortune, run a brothel, and disappear without a trace a few years later. Based on a few surviving documents, bestselling author Henning Mankell has written an exciting, vividly colorful novel about an extraordinary woman who must find her own path between white racists and the black population in Africa.