When We Were Orphans is a compelling thriller by Kazuo Ishiguro, Booker Prize-winning author ofThe Remains of the Day, Never Let Me Go, and The Buried Giant. Shortlisted for the Booker Prize. England, 1930s. Christopher Banks has become the country's most celebrated detective, his cases the talk of London society. Yet one unsolved crime has always haunted him: the mysterious disappearance of his parents, in old Shanghai, when he was a small boy. Moving between London and Shanghai of the interwar years, When We Were Orphans is a remarkable story of memory, intrigue and the need to return.