 |
When a demolition crew turns up four decomposed bodies buried in the basement of Tony Napoli’s Ristorante, the owner, Antonio Sorrentino, now eighty-seven years old, is arrested and faces jail time. Sorrentino has been the proprietor of Tony Napoli’s for almost six decades when he decides to close his doors. Now old and suffering from stage four lung cancer, he is left in jail as the police and FBI question him about his association with the mob in Chicago. One of the men on the case is his "nephew," Dennis Romanowski, a detective with the Chicago Police Department. Though the two are only distantly related, they have developed a strong bond through the years. Sorrentino, or Zio Tony to Romanowski, had taken a young Romanowski under his wing and hired him to work in his restaurant. This relationship remained strong even as Romanowski climbed the ranks of the Chicago PD. Now, when Sorrentino asks Romanowski to listen to his confessions, the detective is reluctant to do so but also curious to discover the truth. With the older man incarcerated, Romanowski is catching grief from both law enforcement and gangsters who want to know what Sorrentino reveals about his knowledge of the Chicago Machine. Where will his loyalty ultimately lie: with the law or with his beloved Zio Tony?
In this gripping crime novel, the author explores the seedy underground of Chicago’s Mafia. Loyalty plays into both the structure of the Mafia as well as the relationship between Sorrentino and his detective nephew. Yet, things are not as cut and dried as one might imagine. Sorrentino’s restaurant has provided for fifty-seven years a meeting place for the Chicago Mafia to hold wedding receptions, make criminal plans, and hold induction ceremonies for newly “made men.” There is no doubt in anyone’s mind that Sorrentino knows a great deal about the illegal operations planned over dinner at his place. Many nefarious things have indeed gone down at Tony Napoli’s through the years, but Sorrentino follows a code that will not allow him to tell police what he knows. Even as he faces spending his last days in jail, he refuses to break the code. Yet, Sorrentino carries a great deal of guilt concerning his complacency with the Mafia. It is this guilt in the face of his impending death by cancer that propels him to confess to Romanowski whether his nephew is comfortable hearing it or not.
Izzi creates a brilliant exploration of human nature through his two main characters. Both stand on opposing sides of the law when the pull of family loyalty forces them to do some soul-searching. Sorrentino is a mentor and role model for Romanowski, who loves him regardless of his alleged ties to organized crime, ties that he suspects are more than he wants to know. Their bond is that of father and son. Romanowski walks a thin line as he navigates between these two opposing elements. Tension builds as the past and present come to a head in Sorrentino’s confession stories. As Sorrentino reveals his deep ties to the mob, his nephew’s high-wire walk between his law enforcement career and his family ties with Sorrentino grows harder to maintain. It is an unforgettable ride through decades of some pretty dark scenarios. Izzi captures the rising tension through both factions of Romanowski’s life. Romanowski’s psychological struggle navigating this precarious situation will have the reader eagerly devouring pages to see where this will end. Beautifully written with a keen eye for authentic dialogue, this one is hard to put down.