Brazilian writer Paulo Coehlo meditates on love and self-realization in this semi-autobiographical work. The story begins when a successful novelist living in Paris returns home from an adulterous rendezvous only to discover that his wife, Esther, an award-winning war correspondent, has vanished without a trace, possibly in the company of a mysterious translator with the code name Mikhail. Some time later, Mikhail reappears and sends the protagonist, now consumed with thoughts of his wife and her fate, on a spiritual quest that eventually leads him to Mikhails homeland of Kazakhstan.