A young Royal Navy Officer is sent to Hong Kong to sign on as third mate on the KWANGCHOW, a Chinese crewed British Merchant ship. His secret mission: gather intelligence on Communist China's developing navy.

To do his job he needs to stay undercover and out of trouble, in an explosive world of corruption and exotic foreign ports, from Singapore to lawless Belawan in Sumatra, and in the perilous fleshpots of Manila.

In steamy Rabaul, he falls in live with a beautiful Australian nurse... and makes promises to her that he may not be able to keep.

The tempations of willing Asian women distract him as he moves from Hong Kong's complex nightlife to the sensual delights of post-war Japan.

From the menace of typhoons in the Taiwan Strait, to the danger awaiting him in Shanghai under Mao's Communist regime, where Freddy is unknowingly drawn into someone else's intrigue.