An urn has gone missing. Inside were the ashes of Anatols Imermanis, a Latvian crime writer and poet, whose last will was to be scattered in Paris. For him, living behind the Iron Curtain in Soviet Latvia, Paris was an impossible dream – both surreal and tantalizingly real. In those years, every Soviet citizen knew the bitter joke: “I again wish to go to Paris” – because the wish could be repeated endlessly, but the journey itself was forbidden.

Twenty-four years after Imermanis’s death, fellow poet Aleksandrs Zapols takes on the case of the missing urn. Like in one of Imermanis’s own crime novels, the search moves from the forgotten corners of Riga to the streets of Paris. But the city no longer matches the poet’s dream, and the trail seems about to go cold. With the help of a local poet, Zapols uncovers hidden layers of both the city and Imermanis’s legacy – art, friendship, a longing for freedom, and a mischievous spirit that refuses to rest. And just when the mystery seems solved, it is Imermanis himself who delivers the final twist – reminding the PÖFF audience that the story isn’t over until the very last reveal.

Marianna Kaat