London Betty is the plucky British journalist who gets a job in the small American town of Pharisee. But trying to get an audience with her elusive, agoraphobic publisher Maury is only part of her problem. Her first story requires the toppling of the corrupt and perverted administration run by Mayor Plumb and his band of off-kilter hoodlums. However, Betty has unlikely allies to help her bring him down: a pair of petty thieves Volga and Billy, a golden-hearted prostitute Jess, and a transvestite ex-Marine hitman, Sgt. Stone.

When young dockworker Jude leaves Liverpool to find his estranged father in the United States, he is swept up by the waves of change that are re-shaping the nation. Jude falls in love with Lucy, who joins the growing anti-war movement. As the body count in Vietnam rises, political tensions at home spiral out of control and the star-crossed lovers find themselves in a psychedelic world gone mad.