In a string quartet, each individual matters, but so do the relationships among them. The four friends who gather in the evenings on a houseboat in Amsterdam to make music have known each other for a long time. The music of Mozart or Schubert helps them briefly forget their sorrows, elevating their sometimes dreary everyday lives or at least allowing them to temporarily escape. However, one day reality cruelly catches up with them. In this multifaceted work, Anna Enquist once again proves herself to be a master of the psychological novel as well as musical composition, a European storyteller of the highest caliber.