The Last Don
A Novel
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5.0 • 4 Ratings
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- $10.99
Publisher Description
A masterful saga of the last great American Mafia family and its powerful reach into Hollywood and Las Vegas, from the author of The Godfather
The Last Don is Domenico Clericuzio, a wise and ruthless old man who is determined to see his heirs established in legitimate society but whose vision is threatened when secrets from the family's past spark a vicious war between two blood cousins.
The Last Don is a mesmerizing tale that takes us inside the equally corrupt worlds of the mob, the movie industry, and the casinos where beautiful actresses and ruthless hitmen are ruled by lust and violence, where sleazy producers and greedy studio heads are drunk on power, where crooked cops and desperate gamblers play dangerous games of betrayal, and where one man controls them all.
Praise for The Last Don
“Puzo is in top form. . . . Head-long entertainment, bubbling over with corruption, betrayal, assassinations, Richter-scale romance, and, of course, family values.”—Time
“The most entertaining read since The Godfather.”—The New York Times Book Review
“Skillfully crafted . . . It gives us Hollywood, Las Vegas, and the mob in one sweet dish.”—Los Angeles Times Book Review
“Puzo returns after a quarter century to the terrain of his greatest success, The Godfather, to tell a second masterful tale of Mafia life.”—Variety
“A compelling tale peopled by memorable characters . . . Puzo is a master storyteller with an uncanny facility for details that force the reader to keep the pages turning.”—USA Today
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Age withers some writers. Others it ripens toward an Olympian wisdom. So it is with Puzo, who at age 76 returns after a quarter century to the terrain of his greatest success, The Godfather, to tell a second masterful tale of Mafia life. Puzo's vision is broader here, and more dispassionate. Times have changed since the day of the Corleones. America has fragmented, and Puzo's new family, the Clericuzios, the shadowy power behind the Mafia, is feeling modernity's centrifugal force. Though still based in New York, the Family has also scattered to Vegas and, as the novel progresses, to Hollywood. Puzo's protagonist is Cross De Lena, nephew of Don Domenico Clericuzio, his Bruglione in Vegas, who by investing in film may fulfill the Don's wish to legitimize the Family. But in Puzo's world, the search for power and wealth demands brutality; dream factories, whether of Vegas or Hollywood, are awash in vengeance, betrayal and blood. Puzo's take on the film world is scathing, yet there are no caricatures here; his men and women can be seduced by virtue as well as by vice and will throw away a lifetime in pursuit of love. Violence slashes through the narrative, but the real cruelty that laces the plot lies in each character's byzantine manipulations of others; the story line would delight a Medici. Nearly above the fray stand two old men, the Don and a film czar. Knowing what the world is, they neither condemn it nor bless it but acknowledge its wickedness and drink of its passion and beauty. As, in this mesmerizing tale, Puzo himself does, surveying the play of humanity in its mad glory. Major ad/promo; BOMC main selection; simultaneous Random House AudioBook; film rights sold to CBS; foreign rights sold in England, France, Italy, Sweden, Finland, Brazil and Japan.
