The Stainless Steel Rat

Slippery Jim diGriz is one of the last real criminals in a galaxy so orderly that crime has nearly died out, and he is proud of it. Then the Special Corps finally catches him, and its chief, Harold Peters Inskipp, makes him an offer: put those talents to work for the Corps instead.

Jim's first big case doesn't stay simple. On the planet Cittanuvo, someone is building a Warlord-class battleship disguised as a cargo freighter, and the trail leads to a pair of off-world crooks called Pepe and Angelina, who have covered their tracks better than anyone Jim has ever chased. To catch them, the Rat will need every dirty trick he knows, and a few he hasn't invented yet.