June 2009 Review “Mr. Talese’s insight will do more to help us understand the criminal than any amount of moral recrimination.” (Times Literary Supplement (London) ) “Brilliant...Indispensable.” (Los Angeles Times ) “An incredible job of reporting.” (Mario Puzo ) “An invaluable document.” (New York Review of Books ) “A marvelous piece of work, showing how a good journalist can catch a man just as he is ready to reconsider his past and is anxious to find someone who will listen...A book about a vanishing way of life in America: the Mafia.” (Newsweek ) Product Description A classic masterwork newly updated The electrifying true story of the rise and fall of New York's notorious Bonanno crime family On New York's Park Avenue on a rainy Tuesday night in October 1964, the famous Mafia chieftain Joseph Bonanno was kidnapped by two mobsters and reported by the police as dead on the following morning. More than a year later, Bonanno mysteriously reappeared, setting off a bloody mob feud that came to be known as the “Banana War.” In this monumental work—packed with intimate details and brilliant reporting—bestselling author Gay Talese first brought to the American consciousness a world and a life previously known to only a few. No other book has done more to acquaint readers with the secrets, structure, wars, power plays, family lives, and fascinating, frightening personalities of the Mafia.
Description:
June 2009 Review “Mr. Talese’s insight will do more to help us understand the criminal than any amount of moral recrimination.” (Times Literary Supplement (London) ) “Brilliant...Indispensable.” (Los Angeles Times ) “An incredible job of reporting.” (Mario Puzo ) “An invaluable document.” (New York Review of Books ) “A marvelous piece of work, showing how a good journalist can catch a man just as he is ready to reconsider his past and is anxious to find someone who will listen...A book about a vanishing way of life in America: the Mafia.” (Newsweek ) Product Description A classic masterwork newly updated The electrifying true story of the rise and fall of New York's notorious Bonanno crime family On New York's Park Avenue on a rainy Tuesday night in October 1964, the famous Mafia chieftain Joseph Bonanno was kidnapped by two mobsters and reported by the police as dead on the following morning. More than a year later, Bonanno mysteriously reappeared, setting off a bloody mob feud that came to be known as the “Banana War.” In this monumental work—packed with intimate details and brilliant reporting—bestselling author Gay Talese first brought to the American consciousness a world and a life previously known to only a few. No other book has done more to acquaint readers with the secrets, structure, wars, power plays, family lives, and fascinating, frightening personalities of the Mafia.