Police psychologist Richard Brock is browsing in a Vienna bookshop when a hyper-nervous young man with a gun storms into the shop and takes several people hostage, including Brock. The young man, a high-school teacher named Sebastian, is fleeing from the police. And though Brock tries to calm him, Sebastian shoots himself before Brock's eyes. Profoundly moved by the tragedy, Brock wants to know what drove Sebastian to take his life. As he quietly wades into the murky waters of Sebastian's family, he unrelentingly chips away at the facade of a respectable, tight-knit clan: Sebastian's captivating, enigmatic sister Maria, his business-obsessed father, and his broken, shattered mother. When she cold-bloodedly kills the man she mistakenly holds responsible for her son's death, Brock knows he must go all the way back to Sebastian's childhood and find the reason why Sebastian, at the age of nine, had tried to commit suicide. The truth has been hidden for over 20 years – but its destructive power is stronger than ever.

Part 2 of the crime series with Anatomy of Evil, Anatomy of Revenge, Anatomy of Fear, Anatomy of Shame and Anatomy of Surrender.