In the carefully controlled, homogenized future expertly evoked in Shadowlife, the patterned lives of the characters turn out to be anything but orderly and serene. Ostensibly the perfect bureaucrat, Felix Seyner, top interviewer for the Central Institute for Biographics, writes a long letter to his old love, Felicitas, explaining himself and his choice of CIB over their relationship. Her reply calls into question the truth of almost everything Felix has revealed. An appended report from the "reliable" government security forces puts yet another spin on events. In a world where national distinctions have been washed away by am undefined ecological cataclysm, the characters struggle to find identity both by exploiting the system and simultaneously subverting it.