Kyril Bonfiglioli's final novel follows the Hon. Charlie Mortdecai from adventure to misadventure via Jersey and Moscow to a final showdown in a Buckinghamshire bungalow of unparalleled hideousness. Tackling en route an unhealthy sprinkling of well-seasoned academics, a cryptic monk, an aristocratic Chief Constable, and more spies than you could shoehorn into a black stretch limo, Mordecai finds himself embroiled in another mission of international insecurity after the death of a lady don in Oxford. Left unfinished at the time of the author's death, the celebrated satirist and parodist Craig Brown supplies the penultimate, plot-resolving chapter.

Portly art dealer and seasoned epicurean Charlie Mortdecai comes into possesion of a stolen Goya, the disappearance of which is causing a diplomatic ruction between Spain and its allies. Not that that matters to Charlie... until compromising pictures of some British diplomats also come into his possession and start to muddy the waters. All he's trying to do is make a dishonest living, but various governments, secret organizations and an unbelievably nubile young German don't see it that way and pretty soon he's in great need of his thuggish manservant Jock to keep them all at bay... and the Goya safe.