Inherit the Mob

July 1, 1991
In an outrageous comic send-up of Mafia genre novels, William Gordon, sardonic foreign correspondent for a New York City paper, returns home to claim the inheritance left by his dead uncle, Mafia kingpin Max Grossman. Gordon, who's in love with a lesbian actress, can collect his share of half a billion dollars only if he serves a stint as ``foreign minister'' for ruthless, elegant Mafia don Luigi Spadafore. But when two hit men enter the picture, Gordon and his hard-drinking journalist cohort John Farrell, who fearlessly insults the Mafia sleazeballs, want out. Enter Gordon's domineering, retired father, Albert, who enlists the services of seven of his former associates from the Jewish branch of the mob. They launch a counteroffensive, complete with 419 pepperoni pizzas, to extricate the errant son. Chafets ( Devils' Night and Other True Tales of Detroit ) zestfully deploys witty dialogue and off-the-wall characters in this fast, funny caper.

August 1, 1991
Pulitzer Prize-winning foreign correspondent William Gordon receives word at his uncle's funeral that he has inherited the power to become a major player in the East Coast Mafia. He is encouraged by his wise-cracking newspaper buddy John Farrell, and together they enter the world of "goodfellas," with its gangland power plays, dirty double crosses, and murderous mayhem. At one point, with their lives in danger, Gordon and his "consigliere" Farrell enlist the help of some retired Jewish mobsters to try to beat the underworld at its own game. The book is amusing, but it's not as smoothly convincing or energized as other books in this genre. Israeli Chafets's first novel attempts but somewhat misses the feel of Tom Wolfe's Bonfire of the Vanities and Richard Condon's Prizzi's Honor, whose idiosyncratic characters caught in absurd situations represent urban and ethnic satire at its best. Still, this formulation of an ever-popular topic, the Mafia, is the stuff of many a successful escapist movie and many a successful escapist novel as well.-- David Nudo, New York

Copyright 1991 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.