The novel is a story of a man named Michael K, who makes an arduous journey from Cape Town to his mother's rural birthplace, amid a fictitious civil war during the apartheid era, in the 1970-80s.

The novel begins with Michael K, a poor man with a cleft lip who has spent his childhood in institutions and works as a gardener in Cape Town.

The country descends into civil war and martial law is imposed, and Michael's mother becomes very sick.

Michael decides to quit his job and escape the city to return his mother to her birthplace, which she says was Prince Albert.

Michael finds himself unable to obtain the proper permits for travel out of the city so he builds a shoddy rickshaw to carry his mother, and they go on their way.

Finally, Michael decides to continue on his journey to Prince Albert to deliver his mother's ashes.

After his job on the railway track is finished, Michael makes his way to the farm his mother spoke of in Prince Albert.

He finds Michael's simple nature fascinating and considers him to be unfairly accused of aiding the rebels.

Upon his escape, Michael meets with a group of nomadic people who feed him and introduce him to a woman who has sex with him.

Some commentators notice a connection between the character Michael K and the protagonist Josef K. in The Trial by Franz Kafka.

Comparisons have also been drawn between the novel and Heinrich von Kleist's novella Michael Kohlhaas, based upon the protagonist's name and similarities of plot, though it is often suggested that Coetzee's work is an antithetical response.

His mother, the police, and Visagie's grandson all treat him with respect of a lesser human on the basis that he looks and acts slow.

This is shown by the fact that K's mother institutionalizes him until she needs him, the police let him wander around unnoticed because he has a childish innocence, and Visagie's grandson treats him as a common servant.

We see K's isolation and freedom continue throughout the book, starting at the Visagie's house where he first begins to learn to live off the land.

The medical officer sums up this relationship, writing to Michael, "[...] you should have got away at an early age from that mother of yours, who sounds like a real killer.

The novel takes place in South Africa during a civil war in the 1970-80s, and K often crosses paths with soldiers throughout the story.

These tend, based on flimsy or non-existent evidence, to accuse K and other people of various crimes such as theft or sabotage, while themselves performing corresponding acts of aggression with impunity.

He does not evince much interest in the war, except as the soldiers pose a threat to him, from which he must hide or risk repeated internment or violence.

The story, which takes place during the apartheid regime and related racial conflicts, makes a reference to race, specifically, that there is a war "so that minorities can have a say in their own destinies."

In March 2022 at the Baxter Theatre Centre in Cape Town, Life & Times of Michael K made its South African debut where it was adapted for the stage by Lara Foot in collaboration with the Handspring Puppet Company.