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Title: Gomorrah
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Manufacturer: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
List Price: $25.00
Our Price: $13.48
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| Gomorrah by Farrar, Straus and Giroux 5 stars for Courage and Prose | This is a worrisome portrait of the extra-legal underworld centered in and around Naples. It is run by "clans" that are much larger, more ruthless, more sophisticated and more international than the American style Mafia family. These clans compete with each other for market share in drugs, hazardous waste, high fashion, arms and anything else they choose.
The prose is absolutely wonderful. Well chosen words provide description of people, life and feelings in a way you ususally don't find in investigative journalism. Both the author and translator deserve credit because this high level of prose is maintained throughout. On pp. 214-5 there is a beautiful rumination on concrete. Phrases, "secrets in the bowels of the economy, sealed in a pancreas of silence" and "micro-criminal excrescence nourished in movies" demonstrate that the prose originates with Saviano.
Organizationally, the book is not 5 stars. It seems like these are loosely tied together articles. It is not clear how the opening part about fashion, shipping and the Chinese ties up with the rest of it. Even within the chapters there are a lot of unfinished vignettes and some come out of nowhere. For instance, Anna Vollero's minute of fame on p. 147, or the mention of local governments "dissolving" which is not explained. Does this mean the schools close? The police get laid off? There is an isolated but interesting piece on Mikhail Kalishnikov, who's invention has helped to make this all possible.
I feel like I received an education on the reach of organized crime in Italy. I knew nothing of the Sparticus trial or the Aberdeen connection. Some of the stories, for instance about the 14 year old recruits training with body armor are chilling.
Last year I read The Sack of Rome: How a Beautiful European Country with a Fabled History and a Storied Culture Was Taken Over by a Man Named Silvio Berlusconi which described how the government operates. Berlusconi inspired laws, enabling the accused to chose their own prosecutor and laws whereby a witness is not compelled to testify do not help in bringing an end to this scourge.
The dedicated police, prosecutors and press of Italy seem to labor in the shadows. Their lives and families are in danger, but they persist. This unheralded group deserves the respect and support of the world, if only in self interest as witness to the hazardous waste tsunami's can bring to their shores.
| | Gomorrah by Farrar, Straus and Giroux An unromantic, grim take on organized crime in Italy | Unlike the Sopranos or the Godfather, this book does not offer a romantic, sympathetic take on Italian organized crime. This book offers a systematic, detailed exploration of how organized crime (specifically, the Camorra) has complete and total control of Italy. The author details all of the facets of society that organized crime controls. Even the environment is addressed in this book as the mob, through illegal duming of toxic waster, has ruined much of Italy, but other countries as well.
Of particular note is that there is no honor among these thieves. The complete depravity is truly unsettling, especially when you come to the conclusion that organized crime is the true power in Italy, and not any politician or elected government.
| | Gomorrah by Farrar, Straus and Giroux (Not so) Bella Napoli | | The book provides a great look at crime and crooks in and around Naples. I lived there for a few years in the mid-1990's and saw much of the same, but from the perspective of an American outsider, rather than a native Neopolitan. I recommend this to everyone that wants to peek behind the facade of Southern Italian charm. Grazie Sr. Saviano... | | Gomorrah by Farrar, Straus and Giroux A great book that speaks the truth!! | | I lived here around the area of Naples for 10 years(parents are italian), and came back back after 11 years due to military...what the writer has said in the book, it's all true. When i would tell my husband, he didn't believe everything i told him, but after living here & reading the book, he now knows & believes me!! Great book, i suggest that others read it. But i also want to say to others, because of this, DON'T BE AFRAID OF COMING TO NAPLES. It is still a beautiful city with some great people!! | | Gomorrah by Farrar, Straus and Giroux I read it in four days. 5 Stars for courage: He broke the silence | If you have been to Italy, surely you have seen people who sell counterfeit goods on the street: Prada purses, Gucci belt, Armani wallet, pirated CD and DVD, etc. Surprisingly, most of them are not made in China, but in underground factories in Naples, the same type of factories that makes dresses for Hollywood stars. This is however, only the beginning of the story. This is a story of the underground economy of Naples, the desperation of its society and underclass, and the exploitation by the sophisticated yet short sighted criminals. The tales are not unlike those of the underground economy of New York and Chicago, but southern Italian style.
With my busy schedule running a business, these days it's hard for me to take some time and read a book in a short time. However, this book was so compelling I finished it in four days.
There are three big criminal organizations in Italy: Cosa Costra (commonly known as Mafia) from Sicily, Ngrangheta of Calabria, and the Camorra of Campania. This book is about the camorra.
First, to answer one of the reviewers from Australia who didn't understand why the author is under 24-hour police protection: This is not the first book written about the camorra or the mafia, in Italy or abroad. However, his story telling style was compelling enough to make the book a best seller in Italy and abroad. This brought to light the dirty and dark secrets of the criminal underworld in a concrete term - something you can identify with (do they control what you eat?), it infuriates you and something you react strongly. It's not just about talking about the camorra in abstract terms, but to name names, name places, and describe in vivid details about the people, their "businesses", and places. So the public realize the extent of the problem and how it affects the smallest things like milk and cookie delivery to cancer rates.
Organized crime societies thrives on secrecy and silence, there is a term for silence among the camorra "omerta". If no one speaks about it and carry on with his life, or speak about it in an abstract term like "oh it's the mafia what can I do about it?" then the camorra carries on their activities. However, with the amount of attention the author brought, especially attention to details, angered the criminals because the public gets a real view of how the system function and is lubricated. Hence they want the author dead. He broke the code of "omerta". That's why police protection is assigned to him.
Remember, if you dare to speak up against their interest, they dare to silence you in the most callous way - school teacher, shop owner, ex-member, judge, lawyer, politicians, it doesn't matter. The book shows that while claiming to be Catholics, the Camorra is even willing to take the life of a priest.
To the other reader who said that the author was trying to make money, I doubt the author made enough money to be worth of numerous death threats and constantly under protection.
I lived in that region. In fact, where I lived had its government dissolved more times than any other places in Italy due to mafia infiltration. I have seen around here urban planning disaster, environmental disaster, and cultural disaster. While the region of Campania has some beautiful parts, it is not far fetched to say it's a third world country within a major EU country.
This book explores many subjects that I have witnessed with my own eyes: the annual garbage crisis where you can't even walk on the sidewalk, and the hoodlums and idiots who set the trashes on fire to worsen the crisis; the store that was burned down because the owner was courageous and refuse to pay the Camorra a "protection" fee; the unjustifiable number of supermarkets and shopping centers in a region where the economy at the bottom.
I have been to Pozzuoli, dined in Quatieri Spagnoli (Spanish Quarter), and it's true, many of these towns are a mess. This book helped to see what the towns are the way they are, beyond the aesthetical aspect. I didnt know about the open drug market where the Camorra test new drug on buyers to see if they die to determine the right mix. The economy is in the drain, but new shopping centers keep popping up. Will those women who tried to kill each other with guns live long enough to shop there?
For the young men, is it a choice among a low-paying dead end job, constant unemployment and becoming someone "important" by joining the Camorra? "For many women, marrying a Camorrista is like receiving a loan or acquiring capital. If that capital will bear fruit and the women will become entrepreneurs, managers, or generals wives, wielding unlimited power." (P.141)
This book should be a wake up call to all the people of Campania, Italians and an alarm for the rest of us. It shows if the social and economic situation in a community is dire, and when the legitimate system is weak and severely flawed, even a small group of people, with their selfish and corruptible nature, can easily turn life into hell for the majority. You don't have to have even visited Italy to appreciate this book. Civil society is fragile and this book shows how hard it is to get rid a social cancer once its takes root.
Camorra thrives because the State has failed its citizens; it provides opportunities and illusions of power and wealth. To quote the book "The system at least grants the illusion that commitment will be recognized, that it's possible to make a career. An affiliate will never be seen as an errand boy, and girls will never feel they are being courted by a failure" (P. 109, The Secondigliano War)
I also recommend "See Naples and Die: Camorra and Organized Crime" and "Excellent Cadavers" to get a better look at the history of Camorra and Cosa Nostra (Silician Mafia) and a broader political perspective to understand the State and the mafia have at many times different sides of the same coin who needs each other to thrive.
| | Gomorrah by Farrar, Straus and Giroux Product Description | A groundbreaking major bestseller in Italy, Gomorrah is Roberto Saviano’s gripping nonfiction account of the decline of Naples under the rule of the Camorra, an organized crime network with a large international reach and stakes in construction, high fashion, illicit drugs, and toxic-waste disposal. Known by insiders as “the System,” the Camorra affects cities and villages along the Neapolitan coast, and is the deciding factor in why Campania, for instance, has the highest murder rate in all of Europe and whycancer levels there have skyrocketed in recent years.
Saviano tells of huge cargoes of Chinese goods that are shipped to Naples and then quickly distributed unchecked across Europe. He investigates the Camorra’s control of thousands of Chinese factories contracted to manufacture fashion goods, legally and illegally, for distribution around the world, and relates the chilling details of how the abusive handling of toxic waste is causing devastating pollution not only for Naples but also China and Somalia. In pursuit of his subject, Saviano worked as an assistant at a Chinese textile manufacturer, a waiter at a Camorra wedding, and on a construction site. A native of the region, he recalls seeing his first murder at the age of fourteen, and how his own father, a doctor, suffered a brutal beating for trying to aid an eighteen-year-old victim who had been left for dead in the street.
Gomorrah is a bold and important work of investigative writing that holds global significance, one heroic young man's impassioned story of a place under the rule of a murderous organization. |
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