When the ordinary life of Virgil Blaine crosses the path of the even more ordinary Doug Coulthard, it sets off a series of extra-ordinary events.

Doug Coulthard is a Filing Clerk and the President of the Unpublished People’s Poet’s Party – Political Unit (UPPPPU) where a catastrophe has just happened; two of his long-time members have been published. The UPPPPU goes on a recruiting drive by distributing leaflets, one of which finds its way into Virgil Blaine’s pocket. Virgil, who is a slight poet himself, attends one of the meetings where he meets Forward Slash who offers him a job. The offer comes with two things Virgil has never had; a job and a car, and on a whim, he accepts.

The problem is, through no effort of his own, his position is suddenly elevated. Virgil says the job is ‘messing with his DNA – Deliberate Non-Achiever’ and he misses his old life, so he hatches a plan to get it back…

Though very ordinary, Doug Coulthard has the distinction of being only one of four hundred and thirty-one Earth creatures who have been abducted by Aliens. The Aliens took Doug to the Canis Minor and back, a round trip of 3.02 parsecs. Due to the spacecraft’s immense velocity, Doug was left with an annoying and sudden ‘tic’ which is to nod his head up and down rather abruptly every four minutes. And now the Aliens are back to take Doug on a ‘quite a few years since we last picked you up’ Reunion Party, which turns out to be one of the worst experiences of Doug’s life….