The Last Testament of Bill Bonanno: The Final Secrets of a Life in the Mafia - Softcover

Bonanno, Bill; Abromovitz, Gary B

Softcover

ISBN 10: 006199202X ISBN 13: 9780061992025

Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks, 2011

Synopsis

An eye-opening look at life—and death—inside the Mafia, The Last Testament of Bill Bonanno is a stunning document written by the son of notorious crime boss Joe Bonanno. Published at the author’s request after his death, The Last Testament of Bill Bonanno provides highly confidential secrets about the inner workings of La Cosa Nostra—offering a behind-closed-doors look at the secret Commission meetings of the ’30s through ’60s and clandestine details of the Mafia’s most venerable rituals, techniques, and indoctrination ceremonies...plus pages of never-before-seen photos. Bonanno’s Last Testament stands alongside Talese’s Honor Thy Father, Pileggi’s Wiseguys, Maas’s The Valachi Papers and Underboss, The Good Rat by Jimmy Breslin, and T.J. English’s Havana Nocturne as an essential work of contemporary crime history—a must-read for fans of The Sopranos and The Godfather.

About this title

From the Back Cover

Born into a powerful mob family, Salvatore “Bill” Bonanno was privy to a private world that existed just outside the law for decades in America—a world ruled by the tenets of loyalty, secrecy, brotherhood, and survival at any cost: the Mafia.

The son of Joe Bonanno—the Godfather-like head of one of the original five New york Crime Families—Bill Bonanno came of age in the Golden Age of the Mafia. In this fascinating final testament he ushers readers into that cloistered world, from its origins in medieval Sicilian and Italian history to its rise, tumultuous peak, and precipitous fall in America. Told from the inside—and complete with rare unpublished photographs of candid moments, major players, rituals, and ceremonies—The Last Testament of Bill Bonanno is the ultimate insider’s final word on one of the most secretive and misunderstood phenomena of our time.

About the Author

Salvatore “Bill” Bonanno (1932-2008) was the son of Joseph Bonanno, the head of the powerful Bonanno crime Family. He was the author of Bound by Honor and coauthor of the novel The Good Guys with Joseph Pistone and David Fisher, and he collaborated with Gay Talese on Honor Thy Father, a nonfiction chronicle of the Bonanno family.

Gary B. Abromovitz is a retired Arizona attorney whose practice involved industrial espionage cases and interaction with criminal profilers from the FBI’s renowned Behavioral Science Unit. He gained access to the real history of the Mafia through in-depth interviews with Bill Bonanno over a twelve-year period.

About this edition

• Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 006199202X
• ISBN 13: 9780061992025
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 368