Scarface

Inspired by the life of gangster Al Capone, this 1930s novel is a noir fiction classic and the basis for both the Howard Hawks and Oliver Stone films.

Raised on the streets of Chicago, Tony "Scarface" Guarino learns early that a life of crime is his only true path to power. But it takes his desire for a showgirl to push him into his first serious crime—the murder of mob leader Al Springola. With Springola's dame on his arm, Tony joins his first mafia gang. Before long, the savvy mob man has changed his name to Camonte and taken on his own territory with an illegal alcohol business, which makes him a rich man in Prohibition-era Chicago—and one of America's most wanted criminals. No cop can get a collar on Camonte—except one as clever as Camonte himself . . . a police chief who happens to be his own blood.