The main character's name as given to him by his birth mother in Vietnam is Vo Dinh Thanh. Taken to the U.S. by his father, Kenneth Hatcher, the boy is given the name Anthony James Hatcher. On the streets of New York, he takes the name "The Deuce," adopting the street slang for Forty-Second Street as his own.

Discussing each name in the first chapter, Tony summarizes the identities and relationships which correlate with each; for example: "The me that's Tony Hatcher is from the Jersey Shore, just outside of Point Pleasant, which is about the most pansy-assed name for a place you could think up."

Tony explains his attempt to run away to Canada as an attempt to join the Vietnamese refugee community that he has heard of in Montreal. There, he imagines, he would belong to the group without the intrusions of having to relate...