Lillian is charming, beautiful . . . and slowly dying of consumption. But she doesn't wish to end her days in a hospital in the Alps. She wants to see Paris again, then Venice--to live frivolously for as long as possible. She might die on the road, she might not, but before she goes, she wants a chance at life.

Clerfayt, a race-car driver, tempts fate every time he's behind the wheel. A man with no illusions about chance, he is powerfully drawn to a woman who can look death in the eye and laugh. Together, he and Lillian make an unusual pair, living only for the moment, without regard for the future. It's a perfect arrangement--until one of them begins to fall in love.

"The world has a great writer in Erich Maria Remarque. He is a craftsman of unquestionably first rank, a man who can bend language to his will. Whether he writes of men or of inanimate nature, his touch is sensitive, firm, and sure."--The New York Times Book Review