In this prequel towards the STAINLESS Rat, Slippery Jim is a brash 17-year-old who has left his parents’ porcuswine farm, likely to embark on a life of criminal offense. The book opens with Jim bungling a bank job in order that he can be imprisoned and sent to jail, where he plans to learn the art of being a master criminal. Deciding how the Bishop should be his coach, Jim units about proving himself worthy of the master’s interest. He eventually must flee his home globe of Bit O’ Heaven with the Bishop, but Garth, the Captain from the dispatch who guaranteed them safe passage, markets them into slavery. The latter part of the book details Jim’s travels on earth Spiovente, a semi-industrial world fighting feudal wars with weaponry smuggled in (against League rules) by Captain Garth.