island of cards takes place in the French Quarter of New Orleans during a period of international turmoil—the French, Haitian and American Revolutions—the story follows friendships and betrayals between a black slave (Zuléma), a French-Créole girl (Marie), and the pirate (Jean Lafitte).
Within a dreamlike tale of deceit, betrayal, deception and rebirth, the transformation of the lives of two young women is presented against the backdrop of the transformation of the North American culture and its geopolitical map.
The novel outlines a formative structure for cultural and socio-racial dynamics in the American South, while posing questions of theology—contrasting European Catholicism with Caribbean Vaudau—and assertions of fate and destiny within the microcosm of the village of New Orleans, set during the pre-American and highly-political eighteenth century colonial era.