Meet Victor Strang, a hapless private investigator who gets one ear bitten off in a vicious attack and loses hearing in the other from the trauma. Struggling to make sense of his life (as well as interpret his surreal dreams of the Pope lifting weights), he visits a psychiatrist. But what good is therapy when you can't hear what your shrink is saying?

Then there's Joe Gendreau, a maverick weights-and-measures man who makes sure gas pumps are calibrated correctly, and that the seven-ounce Bun Buster at Happy Burger does, indeed, contain seven ounces of meat. But as Joe is pulled into a sinister blackmailing scheme that involves a naked Japanese woman, drugs, bees, and, of course, pictures, he realizes that for once he has been swept up in something he cannot control.

And let's not forget Joe Carmody. A college education doesn't stop Joe's hunger to make it in the world of boxing and crime, despite his utter lack of physical prowess or criminal savvy.