This was recommended to me a while back, and it's one of the cruelest,
most violent crime novels I've read. When I mean by most violent is
the for crime novels that are meant to have a sense of realism as
opposed to books written to be over-the-top or are more cartoonish.
This was written by Shane Stevens in '73, and from trying to do web
searches on him he seems to be kind of a mystery man.
Dead City follows three players in the Jersey City mob, Joe Zucco, one
of the crime bosses, Harry Strega, just out of Vietam Nam and trying
to work his way up in the mob, Charlie Flowers, a depressed sort whose
career as a hit man has stalled out and is now doing strongarm stuff.
The book pulls no punches as it follows their exploits, deceits,
double-crosses, and the dirtiest aspects of the mob business. Reading
this, you can't help but feel that Stevens must've had friends in the
mob. This is a book that should be considered a classic, and sadly,
it's hard to imagine any NY publisher taking this book if it came in
today. I don't think I could recommend this book strongly enough.
--Dave
www.davezeltserman.com
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : 09 Sep 2008 EDT