A satirical romp through the corridors of the Foreign Office as Patrick Stubbs is posted as third secretary in the British Embassy in Lower Africa. Mayhem awaits him - an absent-minded ambassador, a bullying first secretary with a dipsomaniac wife, and a crush on the police chief's wife! The author won the 1981 Royal Society of Literature Award for A Breed of Heroes. In 1983 he was chosen as one of the Best of Young British Novelists.