Through an initial misunderstanding, Mrs. Pollifax is given what is supposed to be a simple courier assignment by Operations Chief, Mr. Carstairs, and her ensuing adventure leads her to a career in espionage.

A consistent theme throughout the series is Mrs. Pollifax's tendency to take an interest in people who seem disconnected with her mission, but who either become part of the investigation and/or who prove to be of invaluable assistance to resolving the case.

For this novel, Mrs. Pollifax is tasked by Mr. Carstairs, her CIA superior, to go to Turkey[2][3] and contact Magda Ferenci-Sabo, a known Russian spy and secret double agent[4] who is defecting to the Free World.

In pursuing her mission, Mrs. Pollifax embarks on a wild ride, matching wits with a diabolical double agent, traveling with Gypsies,[3][5] and again surviving imprisonment.

Mrs. Pollifax then leads both friends and foes on a merry chase, as she travels around Bulgaria, on a series of absorbing, and interwoven, adventures, including helping to rescue the student and several political prisoners from the seemingly impregnable Panchevsky Institute.

The usual phalanx of muddled but supportive CIA agents try to follow Emily through the jungles of Thailand and are seriously rattled when one of their directors abruptly vanishes, only to reappear in the Golden Triangle as the head of all illicit drug trafficking.

By the time the real Janko shows up, a murder has occurred, and Mrs. Pollifax and her inexperienced companion are running for their lives from one dusty hamlet to the next, desperately trying to find the informer and save the rest of the network.

Former colleague John Farrell, hired to crack a safe and lift a document signed by Julius Caesar sends an SOS while dodging a professional assassin whom he and Mrs. Pollifax jailed some years ago.

Soon she too is ducking bullets and the old pals are forced to hole up in the Villa Franca—part farm, part medieval fortress and full-time residence of young CIA agent Kate Rossiter's eccentric aunt.

Ancient artifacts, hair-raising chases, art forgery, arms traffic, a nighttime assault on the villa, mysterious millionaires, spectacular scenery and unexpected romance are some of the ingredients simmering in the plot.

Mrs. Pollifax discovers a young woman hiding in a closet of her Connecticut home on the same day that she observes a suspicious white van patrolling the neighborhood.

Mrs. Pollifax hides Kadi in the car and takes to the highway but is unable to shake the van until she calls on her colleagues at the CIA, who send a helicopter to whisk them away to a traveling carnival in rural Maine.

Mrs. Pollifax travels to Jordan with former Company agent John Sebastian Farrell to receive a manuscript smuggled from Iraq, written by an executed dissident Iraqi novelist.

Joining the two operatives on their quest, Joe and the two spies seek an elusive individual who seems to be undergoing a rigorous training for a mission that has world implications.

Mrs. Pollifax—Spy (1971), a theatrical film based on the book The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax, stars Rosalind Russell in the title role, Darren McGavin as John Sebastian Farrell, and Dana Elcar as Carstairs.

The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax (1999), a CBS television movie adaptation of the eponymous book, stars Angela Lansbury in the title role, Thomas Ian Griffith as Farrell, and Ed Bishop as Carstairs.