The Prince of Providence: The True Story of Buddy Cianci, America's Most Notorious Mayor, Some Wiseguys, and the Feds (Hardcover)

by Mike Stanton (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
More than just a biography of Providence's first Italian-American mayor, once considered one of America's most vibrant young politicians, this expos‚ also captures Rhode Island's and Providence's turbulent political histories and their direct effect on Buddy Cianci, one of America's most successful and most notorious politicians. Rhode Island, a haven for outcasts and freethinkers, earned the "colonial reputation as `Rogue's Isle,' a city of hustlers, gamblers and ward-heelers" that continued to be warranted well into the 1980s thanks to Providence being a home base of the American Mafia, an Irish-American Democratic political machine and a cast of dirty politicians. Presenting the complex civic and political environment in which Cianci rose to power, Stanton is able to showcase the mayor as both a product of his city as well as a new breed of Rhode Island politician. Stanton, using his skill as an investigative newspaper journalist, dissects every aspect of the mayor's upbringing, education, public and private lives. Outlining Cianci's virtues and vices-easygoing charmer and accused rapist, anticorruption candidate and king of the kickback, city revitalizer and public funds abuser-produces a colorful, nuanced portrait of the mayor. More than just the story of one politician's success and transgressions, Stanton's in-depth examination of Cianci is representative of the American political system as a whole, which at its best passionately serves the greater good and at its worst serves the whims and wants of a select few.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Journalist Stanton's dissection of Providence, Rhode Island, has a general resonance for urban affairs. That his vehicle is a flawed, flamboyant mayor makes it a colorful story in its own right, in which a good-government politician degenerates into graft with interludes in talk radio and, currently, jail. Vincent Cianci, known as "Buddy" around town, reveled in mayoral power, rewarding and punishing and positioning Providence as a city for concertgoers and tourists. Over time, the construction and rehabbing prompted complaints of corruption, and Stanton, an observer of Buddy from the offices of the Providence Journal, here checks out the allegations in the course of reviewing Buddy's career from the early 1970s onward. Stanton unpacks the ethnic fiefs of Providence that background Buddy's trajectory: an Italian Republican in a heavily Irish and Democratic city, Cianci was a high-wire act with big appetites and resentments to match. A marvelous case study of the adage that all politics is local, Stanton spotlights the machinations and palm-greasing that the phrase implies. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 464 pages
• Publisher: Random House; Second Printing edition (August 5, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0375507809
• ISBN-13: 978-0375507809
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.5 x 1.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (24 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #335,324 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Long Winded Account, August 11, 2003

By	Brian D. Rubendall (Oakton, VA) - See all my reviews (TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

The colorful Buddy Cianci enjoyed a long and sordid career as the Mayor of Providence, Rhode Island. And now, as Cianci is still settling into his cell at the federal detention center at Ft. Dix, New Jersey, having been convicted of corruption, author Mike Stanton has written a long and sordid account of Cianci's life and career. The Cianci story is so compelling that is could sell itself. How does a man go from being an ambitious young prosecutor trying to lock up mob figures to putting wiseguys on the payroll during his tenure as Mayor? That's the question Stanton tries to answer, and would have done so more effectively had he not become so distracted along the way.

As Stanton demonstrates, Cianci is a tragic figure; a man with unique political skills and leadership ability whose dark side ultimately ruined him. Cianci was a charming rougue who knew how to manipulate his supporters and foil his enemies in the same manner as another disgraced big city Mayor: Marion Barry. Ultimately Buddy Cianci was all about Buddy Cianci, and that was what finally did him in.

Stanton obviously loves politics as much as Cianci did. His book is loaded with anecdotes and stories of the Providence and Rhode Island political landscape. Far too many, in fact, for quite a number are either superflous or merely rumor. Stanton repeats rumors that Cianci was hooked on cociane, for example, but never provides any proof. The book runs to nearly 400 pages of narrative, but could have easily been chopped down by about a third. Accounts of Cianci's appearances on the Imus in the Morning radio show, for example, are worth mentioning once, but not four or five times.

Overall, "The Prince of Providence" is a fascinating but overly long retelling of the sordid saga of a fallen politician.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars corruption as entertainment, September 13, 2003

By	Steve Iaco (northern new jersey) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Usually, municipal corruption is infuriating. But the Buddy Cianci story is highly entertaining, often comical. I was not surprised at all to learn that the book had been optioned for a movie even prior to publication. Unlike other reviewers, I was not familiar at all with Buddy Cianci or Providence or its reputation for mob infestation and deep-seated corruption. "The Prince" held me in thrall for all 400 pages as revelation upon revelation of kickbacks, bribery, intimidation and general malfeasance unfolded.

I would recommend this book highly to the most general audience. However, one caveat: it's mostly a book about crime and punishment, not politics. Personally, I would have liked to have learned more about Cianci's failed 1980 gubernatorial campaign. On one page, it appears that Buddy will win by acclamation; on the next, with little explanation, he's a landslide loser, failing to carry one city or even a single hometown ward. Having said that, "The Prince" is still first rate for its pure entertainment value. Definitely five stars.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Prince of Sleaze, September 9, 2003

By	Natalie Harwood (Oxford, OH USA) - See all my reviews

The Prince of Sleaze

You might think that a book about sleaze, cheating, lying, bullying, stealing, bribing and simple bamboozling would be depressing, but instead it's fascinating. Mike Stanton's THE PRINCE OF PROVIDENCE is a jaw-dropping account of Buddy Cianci, the terrible bad boy of politics in Providence, Rhode Island.
Typical of Cianci's abuse of power was his attempt to be admitted to the prestigious University Club. Stung by rejection, he fought back with some well placed calls. The University Club found themselves unable to get building variances, their liquor license threatened and word that police would be out front ticketing every parked car. Incredibly, the mayor was offered a lifetime honorary membership.
The author is well acquainted with the mayor, his office, his cronies and the city of Providence. He describes the "good Buddy", effective administrator, tireless promoter of Providence, with the "bad Buddy", wheeler dealer, bribe taker, but it's obvious the "bad Buddy" prevails. Only the scrupulous reporting and the ebullient personality of Buddy Cianci can keep the reader from wallowing deep in the corruption and dirt of Providence politics. I personally would have liked to see more of Cianci's early life and how the influences of family and school could create such a phenomenon.
If you ever need a reference book of big city politics, this is your how-to Guide to Political Power using methods legal, illegal and every gray area in between.