From a correspondence with an inmate, A. Rykner leads us to reflect on its own private jail and on the other (both so far and so close to us). As a counterpoint, it also raises questions about the double punishment to those who have known the prison purged criminal sentence, he must still pay their being kept out of society, in particular because the criminal record. Reading this moving novel is fluid and easy, even if, personally, I do not like some pseudo-literary turnings (repetitions, line breaks ...)