A Stainless Steel Rat is Born

First American hardcover publication. Written in 1985, it is the first story in the "Stainless Steel Rat" universe timeline.

In the auspicious annals of crime, chicanery, and counterespionage, one name towers above all the rest - Slippery Jim diGriz, the famous outlaw known and feared as the Stainles Steel Rat! Now the uncanny, untold origins of the 25th century's most canny criminal are at last revealed.

This thrilling volume in the saga of James diGriz explores his humble beginnings as a petty criminal on the backward planet of Bit O'Heaven, and his rapid rise to the most wanted man on a dozen worlds. And it contains the never-before-told story of the fabled archcriminal known as The Bishop, who tutored young Jim in the higher arts of crime and gave him his legendary nickname. A rousing, rolicking, often touching tale, A Stainless Steel Rat Is Born is a stirring portrait of a man who learned to laugh at the laws that bind ordinary men.