"The final, definitive match in the competition for the World Chess Championship is about to begin. Contenders Elias Tarsis and Marc Amary take their places at the board. The judges' implacable clock begins to tick, and a hush falls over the capacity crowd in Paris's Beaubourg Center Theater. But before the players can make their first moves, they are distracted by news of the kidnapping of a high-ranking Soviet diplomat. Tarsis--an artist and an intuitive genius--is convinced that his despised opponent--a world-renowned physicist--is behind the kidnapping. So begins the game, and so begins this darkly comic, metaphysical mystery novel ..."--Jckt.