In the Café of Lost Youth opens in the Condé café in Paris in the 1950s. The narrator of the opening chapter, a student in his early twenties, introduces us to some of the café’s regulars, men and women of varying ages who all seem to be adrift. We learn their names and only a sentence or two about who they are. There are no physical descriptions and none are needed because everyone here is temporary, found family, and all will drift apart before we can become too attached.