Once again (for the twentieth time) we plunge into the seamy life of charming rapscallion Lovejoy (Different Women Dating, 1997, etc.), a whiz at recognizing the true antique and at knowing everything about it but a miserable failure at most anything else. This time, he’s involved with one Irma Dominick, who, with Lovejoy’s coaching, has stolen an antique Buckingham jug from Gimbert’s Antique House. Turns out the jug belongs to Irma’s aunt Jocina Crucifex, whose brother is the Reverend George Metivier, head of the Albansham Priory and reputed to be deeply mired in gambling debt. Metivier wants Lovejoy to assess, secretly, the Priory’s antique treasures, and Lovejoy enlists Gesso, his longtime friend and professional thief, to help. Within days, Gesso has disappeared and Lovejoy fears the worst. A search for any clue to Gesso’s whereabouts leads Lovejoy to the Channel Island of Guernsey where he winds up running a show for famed impresario Jonno Rant, trusting all the wrong people but at last learning Gesso’s fate and the secret of Albansham Priory. With a new character, a new bedmate, and a new scam on almost every page, the plot is evanescent—to be enjoyed for Lovejoy’s unapologetic chutzpah and for his author’s breezy narration and vast knowledge, willingly shared, of the antiques world.
