Nickel for the Boatman

Miami was roaring in the 1920s, not only with boat loads of bootleg whiskey and snow birds seeking warmer climes, but also relocated families like Eddies who had left generational homes to forge a new life among Miamis up and comers. It was a city of temptation and excitement, of Prohibition and the beginnings of commercial flight. Eddie, the only child of preoccupied parents, a social-climbing mother and distant, reticent father, feels trapped under the thumb of nuns and priests in a strict Catholic school. Then, Manny Silver appears, and Eddies life changes forever. In the hulking, fastidious mobster he finds a surrogate father and mentor with a soft spot for the teenager. But, there are difficulties. Eddie is torn between his desire for the adult pleasures and freedom Manny offers and the straight path defined by the moral principles of Father Horka, his spiritual guide, who tries to watch over him. In this place and time where the ordinary, the infamous and the famous met on a single stage, Eddie grows up. Set against the backdrop of the most beautiful and untamed places of the era, Eddie discovers the complexities of friendship, betrayal, guilt and loss.