A novelization of the haunting Anthony Shaffer script, which drew from David Pinner's Ritual, it is the tale of a Highlands policeman on the trail of a missing girl being lured to the remote Scottish island of Summerisle. As May Day approaches, strange, magical, shamanistic and erotic events erupt around him. He is convinced that the girl has been abducted for human sacrifice. Yet he is soon to find that he may be the revellers' quarry...