Artie Kipps is destined at the tender age of fourteen for a life of drudgery in the drapery trade … until he unexpectedly inherits a fortune from a grandfather he never knew existed!

Enter:

A whisky-drinking actor and playwright who persuades Kipps to invest in his play!

A down-on-their-luck mother and daughter who promptly see Kipps as a means to escape their (comparative) poverty!

Plenty of patronizing, unthinking social snobs! …

And the stage is set for inevitable disaster as Kipps, stumbling uncomprehendingly through the English class system, is fleeced of his fortune.

But all is not lost. Despite the allure of wealth and class ambitions, Kipps has never quite forgotten his childhood sweetheart. Through Kipps’s endearing bewilderment and simplicity of thought, Wells makes us both laugh and cry as the two re-unite and …

… but you’ll have to listen to the story to find out how it all ends!