Absolutely packed with information
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This is the most thouroughly researched book on the 'Mob, Mafia organised crime' or whatever you qant to call it I have read. It's crammed with information from the very widest sources available, in fact the reference list at the end of the book numbers in the hundreds. The characters in the book are amazing and felt a twinge of sadness when I read of Curly Humphreys' death. Although it's quite an advanced book It was definitely worth reading and would recommend it to anyone interested in The Chicago Outfit as it provides an exhaustive account which means that it may be the only document you need on Al Capone's Heirs
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Interesting study of Capone's successors
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While the New York mafia wasted their time and resources shooting each other and working out elaborate rituals, the Chicago outfit got on with the serious business of making money and extending influence - that is clear from this exhaustive study of organised crime in the Windy City.
What is interesting about this book is the mechanics of how gangsters like Curly Humphreys make money from such seemingly unpromising areas as labour unions. What, in my opinion, is slightly less interesting is the re-hashing of a lot of Kennedys/Monroe/Sinatra type stuff as the book draws to a close. If all that was said was true, that the Outfit 'delivered' the 1960 election to JFK; that Marilyn Monroe was photographed having kinky sex with a Mafia Godfather (not a looker, I might add); that mafia kingpins were swimming about off Cuba on CIA instruction figuring out ways to bump off Castro, then the book has entered a realm that is beyond the telling of mafia stories. I don't know. Maybe it's all true, but it felt a bit National Enquirer to me.
I did like the almost off-hand way that the author dismisses the idea - oft-repeated in this type of book - that organised crime were responsible for the assasination of JFK. He points out, mundanely, that the Outfit bosses seemed as surprised as everyone else, as evidenced by their wire-taps.
Russo makes great play of how the Outfit was just 'the underworld' doing exactly the type of things that the more established world 'the upperworld' did anyway. How the 'robber barons' like JP Morgan broke all the laws, but got away with it because they weren't recent immigrants. Again I'm not sure. That sort of relativism is appealing, but not everyone in the police, judiciary and business world are corrupt. The mafia certainly are and that's one reason why they're good fun to read about. (After all upperworld leaders don't have their subordinates shot if they are attracting too much publicity.)
I guess I wanted a simpler, less grey area type of book, but this is very well-written, well-researched stuff.
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BUY THIS BOOK
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i've been reading about organised crime in the states and italy for quite a few years now and this is by far and away the best book i've come across on the subject of the american Mafia. it focuses on the Chicago "Outfit" from the days of prohibition and bootlegging through JFK, Hoover, Monroe, Sanatra up to the present day and it doesn't miss a thing - it can't do its rammed with info, some of which is unbelievable! who would have thought, the greatest unsung legend of organised crime in the US came from .....Wales of all places! its pretty heavy going in some parts but you definately should BUY THIS BOOK!
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Exhaustive
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Thoroughly researched book and well worth a read even if you have read similar Mob related titles as this one also delves into the part that white collar crime plays. It did leave me with some questions though. Why did Al Capone suffer so badly in prison ?. Why was Joe Kennedy allowed to get away with double dealing the boys ?
How could Joe Kennedy not know that Mooney was fronting for Joe Accardo et al ? And how did the Kansas boys get away with not whacking Desi Arnez ?
Well paced although the time line jumps about a bit,with intriguing questions about the American populaces acceptance of scandal and fixing, although it goes on everywhere.
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