Larry Dunne writes bad avant-garde poetry, works in a Bloomsbury bookshop and puts the world to rights in Joe's Club, named after Stalin.

Then he moves to Hungary, an ideal state where he hopes to bask in universal fellowship and equality. He is already missing his cosy London life, when a woman is murdered in a neighbouring apartment. Under suspicion, with his passport confiscated, Larry realises he could be in Budapest for a long time unless he catches the killer.