It is a gay-themed comedy about four friends who get caught up in ill-fated attempt to scam a Mafia family by faking a marriage and absconding with the cash and gifts that the prospective in-laws will shower on the lucky couple.

Over lunch with Gilbert's perky but extremely naive mother, Maddie, Phillip becomes nervous at hearing about Tony's mysterious comings-and-goings and the surprisingly high number of "accidental" deaths in his family.

Both Gilbert and Moira find the notion preposterous, but Phillip cracks and confides all to his songwriting partner, the brainy Claire Simmons.

At the Cellini family's Christmas party, Claire needs only one quick look to confirm that Gilbert's in-laws are mafiosos, the patriarch of the clan being infamous gangster Freddy "the Pooch" Bombelli.

Claire, sensing something wrong, does further research, and gathers Phillip, Gilbert, and Moira together to reveal the truth: the "Duchess" doesn't exist.

Jonathan Kirsch, writing in The Los Angeles Times, completed the book on its "gratuitously exotic and thoroughly gay" setting, as well as Keenan's "fast-lane patter".

[2] After David Lloyd, then a writer of Cheers, read the book, he—along with series creators Glen and Les Charles—liked it so much that they offered Keenan the chance to develop a new show for television.