Zahid Ali

Wiper
a Spotless Detective

For years, Wassim has been cleaning the same corridors and restrooms in a commercial building in central Oslo. While his brother has a coveted job, a wife, and kids, Wassim is single and not yet sure what to do with his life, to his parents’ great despair. But one day, he is mistaken for the private investigator Kolbeinstveit, an anonymous detective renting an office space in the building Wassim cleans. It soon turns out that Wassim’s passion for stain removal, and his huge network of taxi drivers, tailors, and hairdressers, makes him a perfect detective.

Armed with universal keys and spray bottles, Wassim finds himself gaining access to Oslo’s art and finance elite, and we are thrown head-first into a wild roman noir, stretching from the dingy Gunerius shopping mall to the fancy mansions of Holmenkollåsen. At the same time as Wassim is solving exceedingly complicated mysteries, he must juggle the challenges of family relations and expectations of settling down and getting married. And what will happen when the real Kolbeinstveit turns up to call his bluff?