Louis and Odile are not yet old, just turning 35, yet the occasion of their birthdays has them reflecting on their lives fifteen years earlier when they were young, naive, in love, and in Paris. Odile was, then, hopeful of starting a career as a singer. In a brief span she experienced the best that such a career in its infancy could offer and, perhaps inevitably, also the worst. Louis, fresh out of his two years of National Service, was recruited by older, almost friends, to work as a night watchman of sorts with special errands from time to time. He knows deep down that there must be something not quite right about what his employers are doing, but he purposefully doesn’t ask too many questions. When Louis meets Odile, the vagueness of both their lives begins to evaporate. At least they can be certain of each other, mostly at least.

Patrick Modiano’s trademark anxious realism captures a Paris of the not so distant past which was as gritty and bleak as a noir film. Uncertainty permeates all relations. Decisive action, if it is ever really possible, is opportunistic. Louis and Odile are sympathetic protagonists. You will find yourself hoping for them to succeed but not seeing any route out of their predicament. I enjoyed following their story and, especially, wandering the streets of Parisian arrondissements with which I am familiar. The writing is thoughtful and reflective and so atmospheric.

Recommended. ( )

Much better than the early high-school-student-with-a-thesaurus works, but still nothing particularly astonishing. I now think of Modiano as the guy I will read when I want to read Grahame Green, but Grahame Green in which nothing happens and nothing matters; i.e., it's easy, it'll kill a few hours, and you won't have to invest anything at all. Nor will you remember anything about the book an hour after you put it down. There's a place for such books in the world. ( )

The noirish, atmospheric story of a couple, Odile and Louis, and how they navigate post-war Paris. He works with a mysterious businessman and she tries to be a singer. They both do what they must to survive. The story begins when they’re 34 and 35 with two kids, so there’s no mystery in the ending. The story is in their early adult years. ( )

Patrick Modiano has been discovered by American publishers since he won the Nobel Prize for Literature. This is the first of his books that I have read and considered by some to be his best. Many of his books are now available in English and more are becoming available every day. I found the book boring but it would not impede me from reading others of his. This book is set in Paris perhaps in the 1960s though many of his books are set in Paris during and after the Second World War. His prose is clean and simple which is appealing. I recommend you give him a try and decide for yourself.

Odile and Louis are leading a happy, bucolic life with their two children in the French countryside near the Swiss mountains. It is Odile’s thirty-fifth birthday, and Louis’s thirty-fifth birthday is a few weeks away. Then the story shifts back to their early years: Louis, just freed from his military service and at loose ends, is taken up by a shady character who brings him to Paris to do some work for a friend who manages a garage; Odile, an aspiring singer, is at the mercy of the kindness and unkindness of strangers. In a Paris that is steeped in crime and full of secrets, they find each other and struggle together to create what, looking back, will have been their youth. ( )