England, 1930s.
Now, as the world lurches towards total war, Banks realises the time has come for him to return to the city of his childhood and at last solve the mystery - that only by his doing so will civilisation be saved from the approaching catastrophe.
Moving between London and Shanghai of the inter-war years, When We Were Orphans is a story of memory, intrigue and the need to return; of a childhood vision of the world surviving deep into adulthood, indelibly shaping and distorting a person\'s life..
Yet one unsolved crime has always haunted him; the mysterious disappearance of his parents, in Old Shanghai, When he was a small boy.
Christopher Banks has become the country\'s most celebrated detective, his cases the talk of London society.
England, 1930s
