Adolescent Lionel Essrog suffers from Tourette's Syndrome (an uncontrollable urge to shout out nonsense, touch every surface in reach, stroke people and rearrange their collars). He works, with three other orphans from St Vincent's Home for Boys, for the local tough guy and small time mobster Frank Minna.
Frank is preparing them to become the Minna Men, a fly-by-night detective agency and limousine service. When Frank is stabbed to death, Lionel's world is turned upside down. He attempts to become a real detective, while trying to articulate himself, and keep the words straight in his head as he delves into the complex, shadowy web of threats and favours that make up Frank Minna's Brooklyn...
