Lucifer Jones is back—and on the run again. Having been barred from the United States, Africa (Adventures), Asia (Exploits), Europe (Encounters), and South America (Hazards), he is island-hopping his way across the Pacific to Australia, the one remaining continent that will tolerate his presence.

Seems like it should be an idyllic trip, but then, nothing is ever quite idyllic where Lucifer is concerned. He meets a rather large, rather unhappy couple when he encounters King and Mrs. Kong; he comes across a hermit with an opera singer’s name who has four gorgeous servants—Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday; he falls in with an arduous collector—of heads; he gets passage aboard a ship whose crazed captain is in maniacal pursuit of the Puce Whale; and he eventually tops General MacArthur’s list of least favorite people.

During the course of his voyages he and the reader encounter old friends such as Capturin’ Clyde Calhoun (who brings ’em back alive; not intact, but alive), Erich von Horst (a con man’s con man), and Inspector Willie Wong (who has so many sons he has run out of names for them and uses numbers instead), as well as some new and equally memorable characters.

The Right Reverend Honorable Dr. Lucifer Jones (“Weddings done cheap, with a group rate for funerals.”).