Customer Reviews

Made Men: The True Rise-and-Fall Story of a New Jersey Mob Family

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

The casual, almost semi-cynical, form of writing suits the subject of this book: A minor crime family in New York area finds itself cast in a major TV production. Although the Sopranos don't labor under the lack of respect that the Decalvacantes or "farmers" receive, you do get a unique perspective of the crime family imitating fiction or vice versa. Like many Mafia books, this one is episodic as I suppose it has to be and it is difficult to keep the characters in their place (anyone ever hear of a organizational tree?). Still, it is easy to read and see what is going on.

The faults of the book are that the author's reporter-style writing comes through a bit much. He relies on structured chronological headings, almost like a time stamp. However, this isn't much of a fault and his style works well.

I enjoyed it. It was a quick read. If you like the Sopranos, you'll like this book and it will give you more insight into the real "real" life characters.

I have a huge collection of mafia books and have enjoy the writings of various authors relating to topic at hand. This is one of the most current books to hit the market(2003).
I greatly enjoy the book in the sense that it opened up the DECALVACANTE family a little bit more. Being that the NEW JERSEY family wasn't as big as the BIG 5 in New York, not much has been writing about them, hell... the PHILADELPHIA family has gotten more press and coverage.
This book introduces us to current mob guys that are still alive and fresh. Most mob books are about previous generation wiseguys who have since past away. It makes us realize that as "hardhit" as the MAFIA has been lately, they are still around and scams are still being pulled. It also shows how , like everything else...the mob is evolving right before our eyes....from bootlegging, prostitution, gambling to 21st century scams like insurance fraud, wall street, computer scams, mortgage scams etc.
The only complain about this book is that time and time ago, the author keeps reiterating the same thoughts and descriptions over and over again, maybe he was just trying to fill more pages or thought the reader has the memory recollection of a snail.

When you read this book, you will understand what I means as you will find the same passages over and over again.
I do recommend this book for mafia afficionados to add to their collection, just don't expect it to be a book that you can read again and again and still be entertain. You will read this book, be momentarily entertained, educated more on the NEW JERSEY family. Then you will be bored with it and put it away. The only time I picture myself opening this book again is if I needed to research a certain wiseguy that was mentioned in the book.

This is one of the worst books ever written about the organazied crime. Factual mistakes, event missinterpetation, misspelled names - few examples from the bundle of errors Mr. Smith makes. Lot of references on the Sopranos and the guy misspelles GOOMAR. Vincent "Chin" Gigante's name, according to Smith, comes from his name Vincenzo - man, have you at least seen the guys picture? Look at his CHIN! I can't possibly list everything that is wrong with this book....it's just that the entire book is wrong.

Don't waste your time or money...

I am on the fence with this one. It wasn't bad but there wasn't necessarily anything that was good about it either. Smith attempts to piece together the 1,000 hours of evidence with the known history in order to show us the downfall of the DeCavalcante family. We see it; we see the Mafioso family crumble under the weight of its degenerate members, so Smith succeeded there. But it is his telling that hampers this book from being an out right winner.

One thing that particularly frustrated me was that you would be reading along and Smith would describe something. It would seem as though it came out of nowhere and didn't really belong, but you shrug your shoulders and take it as part of the story. Then further into the book he would talk about that exact same scene, word for word. With no explanation. And this didn't happen just once. It happened repeatedly. Why he did this I could not make sense of it. Additionally, he would have some scenes where you know there is not a wire and Smith could not have known what was said. For example, when Joey O, Anthony Capo and I think Gallo were waiting in a stolen car outside Majuri's house to whack him we are given a word for word recital of their conversation. Yet they were in a stolen car and the three people in the car were not informants, so how does he know this? This was where Smith would try to recreate the scene, which is also where a loosely based scene was turned to fiction in order to further the book. This happened several times.

There were some redeeming qualities. For one, Smith has a dry sense of humor and you can sense it throughout the book as comments are dropped in between the mob's conversation. Additionally, we would read some of the conversations that were going on and can't help but laugh at these violent men. Some of their conversations are hilarious, and I give credit to Smith for strategically interspersing some of these amidst other such despicable acts throughout the book. It adds a comical element to the DeCavalcante crime family, and other crime families, that are usually glossed over.

All in all, a decent rendering of a fall of a crime family. I would read other books first, such as The Valachi Papers, Wiseguys and Underboss, but this is a good addition for anyone looking to read more about organized crime.

3.5 stars.

This book was a boring piece of trash. A child with a 6th grade education could have written a better book. The information was all over the place and quite inaccurate...

I enjoyed this book- I had never heard of the Decavalcante crime Family. I have heard that there were five major mafia families in New York. I have watched the sopranos on Hbo,and seen many of the mafia movies. The writer of this true crime book did a fine job in delineating the history of this crime family as the federal Government was putting it out of business coincident with the production of the sopranos t.v. series in the same city[elizabeth,NJ]. The writer shows in detail how the members of the crime family responded to the pressure that the Government brought to bare upon them. And how they brought about their own burnout. The author did not go into detail about the death of John D Amato in 1991 by Vinnie Ocean and Anthony Capo when according to the T.V. series CITY CONDENTIAL ON BIOGRAPHY CHANNEL. The family learned that he was a submissive homosexual. The family consented to his being wacked.

Length:: 0:03 Mins

This book fully details what it's like to be a gangster during 1920s era prohibition. If you love Mob movies, you will surely love this book. Donnie Brasco is an excellent book as well. I heard about it in the New York times. I was studying at the Georgia State library when I heard about this professor and took his course. He is awesome and I highly recommend him to anyone who wants to learn about filmmaking and other studies.Best of Yukmouth

Im 85 pages in and nothing has happened. I dont know where its going or even what its about.

What a waste of ink!!! I wish there was a way to give this book a review of a negative 5 stars. This author is terrible. The words are mispelled there are sentence fragments riddled throughout all the paragraphs. Most of the time I had to re-read the sentence because I thought it was me. The author left me hanging many times throughout the book. I was like "What the F$%^? Who wrote this garbage?" He must have graduated with his Associates Degree from Essex County College in Newark, NJ. It probably wouldn't have been a bad read if it was written properly. I am surprised no one wacked him for writing so terribly. Geeeze.

I have to say that I must agree with the comment in the Literary Journal review, above, that the writing in this book is disjointed and repetitious. It was so broken that in many cases it was hard to follow. The author jumps from person to person with little background and less connection from one part of the book to the next. I was all ready to like this book. I've been a big fan of The Sopranos, so I was very interested in this book. Unfortunately, it was hard to enjoy. It also lacked the saving grace of those little bits of insider information that can be so fascinating. It just wasn't there.
The author could have taken the approach of directly linking the people and events in the book with Sopranos people and events. In fact, it looked like that was exactly where he was going. At one point he mentions several events from real life that directly coincide with Sopranos events. But then the book disappoints by not linking people, beyond the most general terms and far too seldom to enjoy.
Overall, this book was a big disappointment. I can't recommend it at all.