Vega Gillberg is 16 years old when the police come knocking on the door looking for her older brother, Jakob.

Vega hasn't heard from him in days, but she has to find him before the police do. Jakob was involved in a terrible crime. What no one knows is that Vega was there, too. In the rural Swedish community where the Gillbergs live, life is tough, the people are even tougher, and old feuds never die. As Vega sets out to find her brother, she must survive a series of threatening encounters in a deadly landscape.

As if that wasn't enough, she's dealing with the longing she feels for a boy that she has sworn to forget, and the mixed-up feelings she has for her brother's best friend. During a damp, raw week in October, the door to the adult world swings open, and Vega realises that once she has crossed the threshold there is no turning back.