In the Café of Lost Youth (New York Review Books Classics)

An enigmatic young woman named Louki becomes the focal point of attention at a Parisian café in this love story centered on identity, memory, time, and yearning, set in 1950s Paris. In the Café of Lost Youth evokes a particular Paris of the 1950s—shadowy and secretive, inhabited by writers, criminals, drinkers, and drifters. The novel was inspired in part by the circle depicted in photographs by Ed van der Elsken, centered around Guy Debord. Louki, a waiflike figure, captures everyone's attention while remaining elusive and difficult to understand. Through the perspectives of four different narrators, including Louki herself, the novel examines her character and fate while exploring themes of identity, memory, time, and forgetting.