It was 1977 when a shoeshine boy, Emanuel Jaques, was brutally murdered in Toronto. In the aftermath of the crime, twelve-year-old Antonio Rebelo explores his neighborhood's dark garages and labyrinthine back alleys along with his rapscallion friends. 
As the media unravels the truth behind the Shoeshine Boy murder, Antonio sees his immigrant family—and his Portuguese neighborhood—with new eyes, becoming aware of the frightening reality that no one is really taking care of him. So intent are his parents and his neighbors on keeping the old traditions alive that they act as if they still live in a small village, not in a big city that puts their kids in the kind of danger they would not dare imagine.
Antonio learns about bravery and cowardice, life and death, and the heart's capacity for love—and for cruelty—in this stunning novel.