Discovering a way to build a super-computer using stolen fairy technology, young criminal mastermind Artemis sets out to blackmail a Chicago businessman but runs into a trap that leaves Butler mortally injured.

Artemis is at boarding school in Ireland when he receives an urgent video e-mail from Russia. In it is a plea from a man who has been kidnapped by the Russian Mafiya -- a man Artemis had thought he would never see again: his beloved father. As Artemis rushes to his rescue, he is stopped by a familiar nemesis, Captain Holly Short of the LEPrecon fairy police. But this time, instead of battling the fairies, he is going to have to join forces with them...

"In the days of yore, he flew the skies and scorched angry mobs--now he hides from swamp tour boats and rises only with the greatest reluctance from his Laz-Z-Boy recliner. Laying low in the bayou, this once-magnificent fire breather has been reduced to lighting Marlboros with nose sparks, swilling Absolut in a Flashdance T-shirt, and binging Netflix in a fishing shack. For centuries, he struck fear in hearts far and wide as Wyvern, Lord Highfire...

Artemis's mother has contracted a deadly disease -- and the only cure lies in the brain fluid of African lemurs. Unfortunately, Artemis himself was responsible for making the lemurs extinct five years ago. Now he must enlist the aid of his fairy friends to travel back in time and save them. Not only that, but he must face his deadliest foe yet ... his younger self.

Seemingly nothing in this world daunts the young criminal mastermind Artemis Fowl. In the fairy world, however, there is a small thing that has gotten under his skin on more than one occasion: Opal Koboi. This time his arch rival has somehow reanimated dead fairy warriors who were buried in the grounds of Fowl Manor and had them possess his little brothers. Can Artemis get the spirits to vacate his brothers' bodies before it's too late?

Eoin Colfer serves up the seventh installment in the Artemis Fowl series.