The protagonist is a fictional character named Nicholas Garrigan, a young Scottish doctor who goes to work in Uganda out of a sense of idealism and adventure, arriving on the day of the 1971 Ugandan coup d'état. He relates how he came to be the personal physician and confidant of Amin, the president of Uganda during the Second Republic of Uganda. The novel focuses on Garrigan's relationship and fascination with the president, who soon grows into a brutal and ruthless dictator. Garrigan consciously and repeatedly acts against his better judgment, remaining in Amin's employment until he is far past the point of easy escape physically and morally. Mesmerized by Amin's charm and charisma, he is gradually drawn complicitly into the corruption and brutality of Amin's rule (including his personal participation in the severance of British relations with Uganda, the murder of Kay Amin, the events of Operation Entebbe and the murder of Dora Bloch, and the Uganda-Tanzania War) with fatal results for his friends and colleagues, which Garrigan treats with a mixture of physical disgust; nonchalant, fatalistic acceptance of living under a totalitarian regime; and self-serving denial of culpability.