Gomorrah
by Roberto Saviano
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Book Reviews of Gomorrah
Book Review: There's blood in the streets all around Naples-- and it continues to flow.
Summary: 4 Stars
After a really positive review in the NYT Book Review, I bought this from Amazon and decided to move it to the top of my reading list. Overall, this was a fascinating and deeply distrubing look into the Camorra, the organized crime ring that controls and run Naples and the region of Campania. A couple of thoughts on the positive aspects of the book:
Saviano does a great job of painting the depth of the corruption and the influence of the Camorra. It is incomprehensible just how deeply embedded organized crime is in this area(it is the most violent area in Europe). At times, I was in disbelief at the levels of lawlessness that you almost feel the only solution is a peace keeping deployment from the UN -- or other military solution. The names of the thugs and their bosses are irrelevant since when one is killed or "sings", others just take their place.
The last chapter of the book left me incredulous as Saviano details the environmental catastrophe the Camorra is inflicting upon the region serving as the conduit for illegal dumping of toxic waste in the region.
The sheer courage of Saviano to "infiltrate" the Camorra and expose how deep and dire the situation, the inability of the regional, local or national governments to stem the havoc being wreaked upon the region.
While I found this a really fascinating book, I have a couple of criticisms:
I felt the translation was pretty poor and left me frustrated at points with how choppy the language was.
Not being from Italy, Saviano outlines a dizzying array of names. while this undoubtedly part of the reaon the book has been a sensation in Italy and caused Saviano to go into hiding, the lack of familiarity for a non-Italian means you'll be left scratching your head over all the names being thrown around in this book.
Overall, a good read for someone interested in how organized crime is choking a country and adversely affecting the global economy.
Book Review: A Stilted Trip Through Unfamiliar Italy
Summary: 2 Stars
A full-throttle look at Cammora crime from the nitty gritty ground level, "Gomorrah" is a look behind the curtain that suffers from an author with too intimate an approach to his subject. For a Neopolitan perhaps the geography, family and clan names, capos and underbosses, murders, victims and characters are a uniting thread; but, to the average American reader I think this translation of Saviano's originial Italian work lacks some critical elements that would help to make this story more than the timeline of crime it ends up being.
There is no real protagonist to unite the series of seemingly only loosely-related vignettes, unless one counts Saviano himself, but his role is more that of tour guide, standard-bearer and narrator.
Mixed in are some really interesting details about Cammora business, the purpose and organization of the system, and the lifestyle both for the connected and unconnected. But, these are sprinkled in among dizzying references to different criminal systems, families, clans and characters. Further complicating matters, the translation (I can't speak for whether it reflects the original work) is stark and breathless. In spite of the occasional turn of phrase, metaphor or analogy, the writing is spare and unadorned.
All in all, a staccato and stilted trip through what remains -- even after reading -- an unfamiliar vantage point on Italy.
Book Review: Entertaining, but author is reckless with facts and uses fabrications
Summary: 2 Stars
I returned from a two year military assignment to Naples last year. When I saw this book at my local bookstore the other day, I was excited to learn more about what I'd seen outside the gates of the two Navy bases in the Naples area- Secondiligano and Gricignano. I found the book really entertaining until the author mislabeled the Navy base at Gricignano as a NATO base (it isn't) and fabricated a false warning from US officials to military assigned there (I'll admit the author's lie about how US military officials warn sailors and there families to leave the base at Gricignano only when necessary because the area outside the base resembles a "Sergio Leone film... it's the Wild West out there" added an exciting sense of danger to the story; the truth is, officials conginuously encourage sailors to get off the base to experience the culture). Note I was stationed in New Orleans well before Katrina and, though safer pre-Katrina than now, military officials were justifiably more concerned with crime and the safety of sailors in New Orleans than in Naples, Italy... During my two years there, I never felt as if my life was ever in danger like it is in large US cities... Camorra generally kill Camorra or other criminals. But how would the author sell so many books if he stuck purely with the truth and his own marginal talent?Book Review: Interesting look into real-life crime
Summary: 4 Stars
In America, we've almost romanticized the gangster lifestyle with depictions like those in the Godfather movies, Goodfellas, and the Sopranos. The diminished public presence of the American mafia has probably allowed us to forget the dark, violent gears that allow these machines to run. In this book, Roberto Saviano vividly describes the workings and rivalries of the Naples area, a place where crime families have nearly crippled the city.
When you begin reading this, it is evident that some of the translation from Italian to English did not come through clearly. Some of Saviano's metaphors and similies come across as downright odd, but blame this on the difference of the languages rather than the author or the translator. The book jumps around to different topics in a seemingly random way. Nonetheless Saviano's writing is clear enough to show just how horrifying and violent these criminal endeavors can be.
Overall, I would definitely recommend this book to anyone with even a passing interest in organized crime nonfiction. We're saturated with fictional stories of the mafia, and it's truly striking to hear these real-life accounts of extreme violence and corruption. An interesting book all around, never feeling tedious despite the oddities of translation.
Book Review: What happens in Naples happens everywhere...
Summary: 5 Stars
Update 06-27-09: There is a movie now... Good stuff.
I was stationed in Naples from '91-'94. I roamed all over as military police. I saw corners of Naples that many Americans living there never even dream of visiting. My knowledge was based on hear-say explainations though and I have now many years later begun to study the city and the country to better understand what I saw when I lived there. This book has been a real eye-opener. I suspect it is slightly sensationalistic but he tackles a topic that few authors want to and his life is on the line for it today. Hopefully more Italians will follow his lead and step up and make their society a better one free of the crime that haunts their land today. This is a long, long way from the other Italian books that I love - the ones by Francis Mayes.
I was shocked to see that I spent much of my free time in the heart of Camorra territory - Casal di Principe. I have friends there and we never spoke about the mafia. I was in that town day and night many, many times.
FWIW I felt safer in Naples at all hours than I have in many American cities and hope to go back someday for another extended visit.