The novel describes ten evenings out of the life of the 23-year-old office clerk Frits van Egters living in Amsterdam.

Though the war itself is hardly mentioned, the story gives, by describing an individual's experiences, a detailed description of contemporary post-war society which was marked by fear, boredom and loneliness.

Godfried Bomans in Elsevier magazine described the novel as "grim, cynical and totally negative".

[2] In 2007, De avonden was named as one of the Top 10 Dutch language novels of all time by readers of the newspaper NRC Handelsblad.

[3] The book was released as Die Abende in Germany in 1987, Les soirs in France in 1989, Az esték in Hungary in 1999, Večery in Slovakia and Kvällarna in Sweden in 2008, and Las noches in Spain in 2011.