The Throwback (novel)

His illegitimate grandson Lockhart (aka "the Bastard") combines sexual and educational innocence with an alarming propensity for violence when he or his wife is threatened.

The plot involves the pair making a double marriage while on a cruise, Edwin to the grasping middle-aged Mrs. Sandicott (who desires to marry a very rich old man with as short a lifespan remaining as possible) and Lockhart to her innocent and beautiful daughter Jessica (who knows as little of real life as he does and wants nothing more than a stereotypical male hero).

The other strand has Lockhart and Jessica moving to Sandicott Crescent in the south London suburb of Purley and fighting an innocents' battle together against the modern world.

Lockhart is not at home in his new suburban environment and subsequently loses his job in his mother-in-law's accountancy firm (courtesy of and in retaliation by his mother-in-law when Edwin's will includes another clause stating that if Lockhart ever finds his natural father the entire Flawse estate and inheritance immediately reverts to him) and longs for home.

Unable to get another job since he doesn't statistically exist (thanks to his grandfather's refusal to register him with a birth certificate or with the National Health Service), Lockhart embarks on a prolonged, complicated, merciless and ultimately successful campaign to evict the tenants of the houses owned by Jessica so that they can be sold.