The promotional text refers to the storyline which can be summarized as follows: The novel begins after the incidents on the Ibis, which was caught in a storm and eventually ended up in Mauritius, but with a few passengers less.

From the details of the changing lives and traditions of Indian migrants in Mauritius, the novel traces the fate of other characters from the Ibis and describes the opium trade in China.

The plot is set in Fanqui town, a small strip of land used by foreigners to trade with local Chinese traders, a year before the First Opium War.

In 1838, three ships are caught in a raging storm in the Andaman Sea: the Anahita, owned by Bahram Modi, a Parsi opium trader from Bombay; the Redruth, owned by Fitcher Penrose, on an expedition to collect rare species of plants from China; and the Ibis (from the previous novel Sea of Poppies), carrying convicts and indentured labourers.

Bahram Modi, a lowly son-in-law of the rich Parsi shipbuilder Rustamjee Mistrie, has convinced his father-in-law to provide him seed capital to enter into the opium trade, carried out multiple successful expeditions to China, and created considerable wealth in the process for his in-laws.

David Davidar writing in Outlook notes, "Conventional wisdom has it that in the age of Twitter long striders in the world of fiction are doomed to extinction.

Generous helpings of humour, adventure (the hunt for the golden camellia was a favourite), history, romance, villainy and suspense are expertly blended into the narrative to make for a rich and entertaining read".

His grasp of the detail of the period is exhaustive – he is so thoroughly submerged in it – that readers can't possibly remember all the things he shows them, or hold on to all the life-stories of all the characters he introduces."