In Stiletto, a woman, Nadja Vidal, searches for the murderer of her sister. This search goes through differing moments of reality, or unreality, that are imbricated within each other in facets of a broken-up time sense.

The investigative structure does not create suspense; the dialectic murderer/victim does not exist. What is revealed is the juxtaposition and the confrontation of the different points of view, of the different looks in relation to the story, and to Nadja.

It is the point of view of Needleman, the eyewitness, of the female narrator, objective and journalistic; and of Nadja, caught in a narcissistic relationship to herself, and in rivalry to her sister.

The crime is fabricated bit by bit, like the staging of a spectacle and it is in the traditional tools of seduction (the spiked heels) that the weapons will be hidden. Ultimately, the crime Nadja achieves makes her neither a triumphant heroine nor a victim.