'I am nothing. Nothing but a pale shape, silhouetted that evening against the café terrace, waiting for the rain to stop'

Guy Roland, a private detective in Paris, is trying to solve the mystery of his own past. His memories erased by amnesia, he has no idea where he is from, or even his real name. As he searches for clues through the city's shadowy streets and smoky bars, latching on to strangers, accumulating mementoes, photographs, scraps and stories, he starts to piece together the events that brought him here, all leading back to the murky days of wartime occupation.

Patrick Modiano's portrait of a man obsessively hunting for his lost identity is an intoxicating noir masterpiece; a meditation on who we are and how we forget.