Faking her own death, Joan Foster flees to an Italian seaside resort there to take stock of her life - and death - so far: a life of multiple identities and transformations, from fat girl to thin, from red hair to mud brown, from London to Toronto, from Polish Count to radical husband to the Royal Porcupine (her 'con-create' poet lover), from the secret writing of gothic romances to life as Canada's 'most distunguished female poet'. Blundering from one adventure to another, each crisis more lurid and extraordinary than the last, our irrepressible heroine is always hilarious and always a survivor - if only just.