The young Markus Hauser takes a job with Selma Bruhns, an eccentric elderly lady, who pays him to arrange hundreds of letters in chronological order. For six days Markus works conscientiously, all the while penetrating little by little into the past of this woman who surrounds herself with cats and memories. On his last day, Selma proposes a bargain: a game of cards that will change his life forever. Written in the style of a detective novel, The Game of Cards pieces together the puzzle of life fractured by war, and plunges the reader, along with the characters, into a strange and troubling world.