In the collaborative book, La vida contada por un sapiens a un neandertal, the writer Juan José Millás and the paleoanthropologist Juan Luis Arsuaga set out to understand life, its origins, why we are who we are, and what has brought us here. For two months, the two authors visited a variety of places, many of them common settings of everyday life, and others unique sites where it is still possible to find remains of what we once were, the place where we came from. Humanity’s traces over the millennia can be found around us, in places such as landscapes, caves, children’s parks and toy shops. In conversation with the journalist Yolanda Ruiz.