Five Families cover art

Five Families

The Rise, Decline, and Resurgence of America's Most Powerful Mafia Empires

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Five Families

By: Selwyn Raab
Narrated by: Paul Costanzo
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About this listen

Genovese, Gambino, Bonnano, Colombo, and Lucchese. For decades these Five Families ruled New York and built the American Mafia (or Cosa Nostra) into an underworld empire. Today, the Mafia is an endangered species, battered and beleaguered by aggressive investigators, incompetent leadership, betrayals, and generational changes that produced violent, unreliable leaders and recruits. A 20-year assault against the five families in particular blossomed into the most successful law enforcement campaign of the last century.

Selwyn Raab's Five Families is the vivid story of the rise and fall of New York's premier dons, from Lucky Luciano to Paul Castellano to John Gotti and more. The book also brings the listener right up to the possible resurgence of the Mafia as the FBI and local law enforcement agencies turn their attention to homeland security and away from organized crime.

©2005 Selwyn Raab (P)2015 Tantor Organized Crime True Crime Thought-Provoking

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Critic reviews

"This masterpiece stands an excellent chance of becoming a bestseller with crossover appeal beyond devoted watchers of The Sopranos." ( Publishers Weekly)
All stars
Most relevant

If you could sum up Five Families in three words, what would they be?

Well narrated, Interesting, informative,

What other book might you compare Five Families to, and why?

Mob Boss: The Life of Little Al D'arco, the Man Who Brought Down the Mafia, Along similar lines but different story and a different perspective of the life.

If you made a film of this book, what would be the tag line be?

"The Five Families: The money the lies and the killing’s from Bensonhurst to Broadway"

Any additional comments?

Superb book couldn’t recommend it highly enough.

"Superb"

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from day one till now, covering the history of cosa nostra and it's 5 most influential families and figures

a very indepth insight into the history of the mob

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Hugely enjoyable. Terrifying. Well written. Terrifying. Wonderfully narrated. Terrifying. Did I say terrifying? Because it expresses the banality of evil so well

Superb

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I found it hard to keep up however with all the different characters & comings & goings. I found I wasn't really taking things in & listened on double time in the end. Very good research though.

Very Comprehensive 3.5 stars

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This is a long book that delves into every significant figure in almost a century of the world's most famous criminal network. The fact that it's divided into five autonomous sub-divisions all operating at the same time: makes it occasionally hard to follow. But Raab does a solid job of making the narrative compelling, despite the fundamentally repetitive nature of listing the doleful lives of an endless stream of barely literate thugs who preyed on people who work for a living. .

I particularly admire that Raab never sinks into the common trap of romanticizing these parasites on society: and pays due attention to the many, many people who were victimized by them, and the costs the imposed on every aspect of life in the city throughout the 20th century.

Costanzo does a good job as narrator.

Comprehensive review of a repulsive organization

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