All the Names by José Saramago

About the Book

A subtle and insightful story about boredom, passion, curiosity, and memory from the Nobel Prize-winner José Saramago

Senhor José is a lonely civil servant who spends his days laboring in the labyrinthine stacks of Lisbon's central registry. Among the file cards for the living and the dead, one – of an apparently ordinary woman – will transform his life. Breaking away from his strict routine, José resolves to track the woman down, obsessively following a thread of clues in a bid to rescue her from oblivion deeper than the grave.

'When a very good book finds us at just the right moment in life, it can become stitched into our own identity. All the Names – a novel about identity and connection – has become stitched into mine' Samantha Harvey, Independent