Saint-Exupéry's first novel follows Jacques Bernis, a young airmail pilot who flies the route between France, Spain and West Africa. It moves between his youthful love for a woman he cannot hold, his restless longing and his work carrying letters across the desert. The book blends romance with the new world of aviation, and already shows the themes that mark the author's later work: solitude, duty and the search for meaning beyond everyday life. It is short, poetic and tinged with melancholy.