The aging writer Aurelio Morelli is disillusioned: although the critics like his books, they are barely read. He develops hatred on youth and their depraved moral. One night he goes with a callgirl - and kills her. The police doesn't have a clue, only the unscrupulous sensational journalist Bossi suspects him. Instead of naming him to the police, he persuades Morelli to write about the murder for his paper. Morelli uses the occasion to write his memoirs, in which he confesses lots of other crimes before this last one.