The Aspern Papers is about a researcher searching for some love letters written by a great poet to a young woman he was thought to love when he himself was young. The researcher finds that the woman, now very old, is living in an old palace in Venice on very limited means. In an attempt to secure the papers, he rents a room in her dilapidated palace and attempts to worm his way into her regard by promising to restore her flower garden. The old woman has a young niece living with her and looking after her, and the researcher finally attempts to get at the papers through the niece. This is a tight-knit suspense story, the tension of which increases as the old woman lies dying. It is one of Henry James' must-read novellas, in a class with The Turn of the Screw.