Jacques, who falls in love with him, despite it all-Bourne (not his real name) takes on the whole world…and triumphs. Aided only by an array of surprising skills he didn't know he had-and a beautiful Canadian economist named Marie St. The Bourne Identity from 1980 may be Ludlum's most famous book, not least because it gets the formula so right.īonking Jason Bourne on the head and erasing his memory at the outset means he's more innocent than any three innocent people you can name put together-and the overwhelming, confusing, dangerous forces arrayed against him look even more overwhelming, confusing, and dangerous than they would if Bourne actually had a clue. Robert Ludlum, the author of The Bourne Identity, specialized in Cold War spy-thriller novels in which one innocent dude is chased by gaggles of cold-eyed thugs through death-defying plot twists, narrative switchbacks, and right over the occasional leap of logic. And then all the occupants try to shoot you. It's just like opening the closet door and discovering you've walked into the wrong-sex bathroom. He's pulled nearly dead out of the Mediterranean Sea…and soon he's racing across Western Europe with everybody and their hired thugs determined to kill him, including some international terrorist assassin named Carlos.

He doesn't even know what his really name is (hint: it's not Jason Bourne). If you've ever had someone come up to you at a party and say, 'Hi! So great to see you!' and realized, deep down in your heart, that you have absolutely no idea who they are if you've ever turned a corner in your car and realized that you are so utterly lost you aren't even sure what city you're in if you've ever been a kid on the first day of kindergarten, then you know that sinking, fish-so-far-out-of-water-you're-not-even-sure-what-water-is feeling that plagues Jason Bourne throughout the novel.īourne has amnesia. The Bourne Identity is about not knowing what the heck is going on.

The bourne identity by robert ludlum