Stewart and his sister Lennie remember a culturally rich and pampered upbringing, dragged around the Middle East by an often absent father. It felt like any normal family... until they discovered what dad really did.

We’re in the company of Miles Axe Copeland II, in a world of lavish parties attended by great writers and mysterious colonels. The dangers of dad’s career become apparent when armed raiders break into the family home in Damascus.

Miles survives the armed raid on his home, but was everything as it seemed? Stewart and his sister Lennie follow dad back to a childhood in Birmingham, Alabama, then into his exploits during the war. Miles meets the man who will eventually recruit him into the CIA, and receives the secret orders which change his life forever.

A death at sea offers Miles some “exploitable opportunities”.... Arriving in London, he chases German spies, plots to murder a love rival and attempts to steal a safe containing the plans for D-Day. Dodging trouble, and German bombs, he finds his true calling - and a wife.

Miles convinces the CIA he is “thoroughly amoral” and is sent on special assignments in the Middle East. After masterminding a coup in Syria he turns his attention to regime change in Iran. Along the way there’s an extraordinary encounter with ‘The Cat Lady’.

Moving his family to Cairo, Miles strikes up a close relationship with General Gamel Abdel Nasser, grooming him for the Egyptian presidency... and finds himself at the centre of the Cold War power struggle.

Miles is drawn further into a world of exploding cigars, truth drugs and double agents. He plots the assassination of his General Nasser and befriends a man who will shock the world by defecting to the Soviet Union.

Stewart and Lennie attempt to separate fact from fiction in their father’s extraordinary life and consider whether their own lives were affected by their father’s lies and deceptions. And they hear from others who have grown up as the children of spies.