Things aren’t going well for writer Col Newton. It’s ten years since he published his only novel, a critically acclaimed commercial flop.

Then out of the blue, he hears from his old university friend, Chris Lazenby. There had always been rumours Lazenby was a spy. Turns out the rumours were true.

Lazenby has a tempting proposal for Col. He’ll pay him fifty grand to write a novel. There’s just one catch. The book will never be published and Col can’t tell anyone he’s written it.

It’s all part of a cover story Lazenby is constructing for an agent in the field posing as a novelist.

With his literary career in the doldrums, Col agrees. But things quickly spiral out of control when Col witnesses Lazenby use his unarmed combat skills in a shockingly violent outburst.

But when the money starts to flow into his bank account, Col puts his qualms behind him.

He soon finds that without the prospect of publication to distract him he is producing the best thing he has ever written.

He now wants the book for himself, but will Lazenby agree? And when Col finds out what happened to the last writer who helped Lazenby, he realises that, like Scheherazade in A Thousand and One Nights, his life depends on the tale he tells.