An American journalist pursues an old Communist leader, disgraced and sought by his own party, through back streets of Paris.

Partisans is concerned with the efforts of a young man to search out, to recognize, and ultimately to affirm, his own identity. Barney Sand, adrift in postwar Paris, is not, however, just any man, nor is he everyman. There are others who make sure of this: Sand's father, a distinguished United States career diplomat; Jacobi, longtime Party leader, whom Sand had known for one day in his youth and whom he now wants to find; Marat, one of the Party strongmen, who attempts to indoctrinate Sand; Lise and Olivier, Sara and Rudi--each joined to the web of Sand's experience. Partisans is a many-faceted book. It is a novel of suspense, imbued with drama and tension. It is a novel of the chase, of the hunted and the haunted, threading the maze of a Paris that is a murky half-world unto itself. Finally, Partisans is a novel concerned with the ideas and human values with which the questing modern man must come to terms.--From publisher description.