Set in the Caribbean, Texas, and historic Charleston, SC, a recently divorced Angus Tyle decides it's time for a new life but goes about it so recklessly that he ends up wishing for the quiet world he had left. The divorce leaves him disillusioned about people and careers; he begins to question how he should spend his life. Soon after starting a job as a factory manager, he accepts an assignment to scout a location in Georgia for a new technical center, thinking time on the road will do him good. During the trip, he joins a search for a famous writer, Sid Tellek, whom Angus learns has walked away from his exclusive retirement community. Among the searchers is a man who says he works for the government and must find Tellek before undesirables get him. Tellek, he claims, was a spy for the United States who wrote as a cover for his clandestine activities, never expecting the success he got as a writer. The search takes Angus through Georgia forests, Texan plains, and Carribbean islands where he finds more adventure and romance than he thought possible, so much, in fact, that it nearly kills him.