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A police call links a woman in Paris to a death. She lives there with her family, far from Le Havre. Police have found a body on that port city's beach. A clue points to a possible tie between her and the victim. They ask her to come to the station for questioning.

Maylis de Kerangal's novel blends noir crime fiction with a woman's account of grief and memory. The inquiry brings back parts of her past. She recalls the pain of first love and her father's death. She also remembers the festive naming of a ship before its launch. Her private distress meets the blunt force of police procedure. The search reaches beyond solving a crime to questions of self and lived experience.

Le Havre has its own story alongside the narrator's. She left the northern French port twenty years earlier. Allied forces destroyed it during the Second World War. Rebuilt since then, it now serves as France's main entry point for drugs. Its grey streets and bleak weather shape the setting.

This Folio edition features Sanda Spiridon's translation from French. De Kerangal lives in Paris and writes novels and short stories. Her work has won the Prix Médicis and ten French literary awards for one novel. She has also received a Man Booker International nomination.