"Soon after her twenty-fifth birthday, Libby Jones returns home from work to find the letter she's been waiting for her entire life. She rips it open with one driving thought: I am finally going to know who I am. She soon learns not only the identity of her birth parents, but also that she is the sole inheritor of their abandoned mansion on the banks of the Thames in London's fashionable Chelsea neighborhood, worth millions. Everything in Libby's...

Winner of the Scotiabank Giller Prize
Man Booker Prize Finalist 2011
An Oprah Magazine Best Book of the Year
Shortlisted for the Governor General's Literary Award for Fiction
Berlin, 1939. The Hot Time Swingers, a popular jazz band, has been forbidden to play by the Nazis. Their young trumpet-player Hieronymus Falk, declared a musical genius by none other than Louis Armstrong, is arrested in a Paris café.

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When an unsuspecting violinist, the tall blond man, is misidentified by the head of a spy network to his assistant as the target of their investigation and a superspy himself, a series of wacky misunderstandings and silly situations ensues. As the assistant, his henchman fall all over each other in their misguided attempts to discover the alleged superspy₂s vital secrets, his best friend happens by and only further complicates things.

In London, a real-estate scam puts millions of pounds up for grabs. This attracts some of the city's scrappiest tough guys, along with its more established underworld types. All are looking to get rich quick. While the city's seasoned criminals vie for the cash, an unexpected player -- a drugged out rock 'n' roller presumed to be dead but is very much alive. He has the multi-million dollar prize fall, literally, into his hands.