The streets of East London teem with different languages, cultures and religions. Private investigators Lee Arnold and Mumtaz Hakim are well-versed in the community's tensions, the sad day-to-day reality that includes the desecration of graves at Plashet Jewish cemetery in East Ham. How ever, the destruction of these final resting places leads to a disturbing discovery - one of the damaged coffins does not contain human remains, but instead a sculpture of a man made of clay. This so-called 'golem', a term from Jewish myth given to a figure brought to life by supernatural means, proves intriguing to Arnold and Hakim, even more so when it is stolen in an armed raid from a police storage facility, leaving a man dead in its wake.

The case leads the pair into the past in London and Prague, and onto the trail of a jewel worth killing for.