A local official arrives at the old people’s home for a celebratory dinner on the occasion of Mr. Carlson’s centennial. But the honoree, who doesn’t like all the fuss, in slippers climbs out of the window and disappears. In the first hour of his freedom he manages to do a great deal—and now the old man is being chased by both the police and bandits… Without interrupting the thrilling narrative of chases, escapes, and bribes, Jonas Jonasson, in his very funny adult fairy tale, manages to make fun of detective stories, the Bildungsroman, a family saga, a sentimental love story—and offer his own version of the twentieth century’s story.