The story is based on Céline's escape from France to Denmark after the invasion of Normandy, after he had been associated with the Vichy regime.

In the first edition, some of the characters have the same names as the real people who inspired them.

Because of this, Céline was sued for defamation, and in subsequent editions all characters have fictional names.

[2] It was also adapted into the 2015 graphic novel La Cavale du Dr Destouches by Paul and Gaëtan Brizzi, along with Céline's other novels Castle to Castle and Rigadoon.

This article about a World War II novel first published in the 1960s is a stub.