The Solitaire Mystery Author:Jostein Gaarder, Sarah Jane Hails (Translator) A boy and his father on a journey from Norway to Greece, in search of the boy's mother; a dwarf who gives the boy a magnifying glass, and a baker who gives him a bun; a miniature book that tells the story of a sailor shipwrecked on a desert island in the year 1790; a pack of playing cards with a life of their own; a joker, who looks too deep... more »ly and too much.
These are the ingredients in this fascinating story-within-a-story, in which fantasy and reality, the present and the past, are brilliantly mixed. Structured in 52 chapters like a pack of cards that are shuffled together and fall into place at the very end, it is a rich, teasing book that throws up endless questions about the way the world works, and why we are here.
In many ways a companion volume to Sophie's World, Jostein Gaarder's extraordinary international bestseller, The Solitaire Mystery is a dazzlingly imaginative and stimulating book for everyone who enjoys exploring philosophical ideas.« less