Udo Berger, aspiring writer and wargames champion of Stuttgart, decides it is time to take his new love, Ingeborg, on holiday to the Costa Brava. He brings along his new game, The Third Reich, which he plans to practice for the upcoming wargames tournament in Paris, where he will finally meet the sleek American champion, Rex Douglas. However, things take a sinister turn when some shady locals arrive on the scene and one of Udo's friends disappears. Pursued by a shadowy detective who visits his nightmares in quest for the truth; the surrealistic landscape of the Costa Brava and his increasingly feverish dreams draw him further into delirium. Finally, he finds himself locked in mortal combat when he engages in a game of Third Reich with the enigmatic and disfigured El Quemado - a foreigner who lives in a Kafkaesque burrow on the beach. Unpublished in any language during Bolano's lifetime, this story of one man's journey into nightmare will make a welcome addition to this author's already astonishing oevre.