Reading the West Book Awards Nominee
A Southwest Book of the Year
Amazon, A Best Book of the Month
The Washington Post, A Most Anticipated Title
Deadly Pleasures Magazine, A Best Book of the Year
CrimeReads, A Notable Book of 2023
"Goldberg is charming and sharp, with a quip for every occasion . . . Although each book stands on its own, taken together, the Gangsterland novels read like a single sweeping story with a large cast and numerous storylines, which Goldberg compares to the slow-developing character arc over the course of several seasons of shows like Game of Thrones and The Wire. This gave Goldberg a great deal of latitude to tell the story in an emotionally satisfying way . . . Goldberg’s success in this anti-heroic mode is rare in the world of crime fiction. Where many writers emphasize the violence in their stories, Goldberg pays equal attention to its psychic aftermath." —Jim Ruland, Los Angeles Times
"A delicious comic noir." —Jennifer Rothschild, Arlington Magazine
"Endlessly entertaining . . . Gangsters Don’t Die is an authentic, fully realized, modern-day noir thriller. For readers who want excitement but don’t want to skip out on character development and interiority, this book is a great choice." —Benjamin Selesnick, Jewish Book Council
"The twists, turns and reversals are never-ending and the dialogue is off the hook. Goldberg is gifted in using artful F bombs and his candid observations through the narrative almost come off like Samuel Jackson." —Mike Sonsen, L.A. Taco
"The plotting alone is impressive as Cupertine and Cohen’s lives merge into one again, but Goldberg’s real skill is to explore morality and justice as his protagonist struggles to escape the consequences of his actions and his family’s bloody history." —Book and Film Globe
"Goldberg’s Gangsterland series has been one of the standouts in the world of crime fiction in recent years, and now the trilogy is coming to a conclusion with the publication of Gangsters Don’t Die. Sal Cupertino, the hit man on the lam, posing as a rabbi, is one of the more original figures you’ll come across, and now he’s making one last desperate gambit to get his life back. You won’t want to miss these books, so if you haven’t already, brush up on your Goldberg."—Dwyer Murphy, CrimeReads
"A mesmerizing comic noir that’s fully accessible to series newcomers . . . This is a stellar end to one of the most inventive crime series in recent memory." —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Perhaps the most well-written of the trilogy’s installments, Gangster’s Don’t Die has a great story, exciting characters, and a few nifty surprises." —Booklist
“There’s a machine gun in this book, the rat-a-tat-tat prose that punches page after page—but don’t let it fool you, there’s also true wisdom in here. In the midst of the mobsters, rabbis, shysters, Springsteen, and of course the Torah, you will get an education—about family, about murder, and about having a code. Gangsters Don’t Die is delicious. Tod Goldberg is part-Chandler, part-shaman, and all-killer.” —Brad Meltzer, bestselling author of The Lightning Rod
“Tod Goldberg concludes his smart, irreverent, and bloody Gangsterland trilogy with a bang. Gangsters Don't Die is a tour-de-force that is witty, violent, and brilliantly observed. With these three novels, Goldberg has forever changed the crime genre for the better—elevating it with unforgettable characters, humor, and style to spare. I didn't want it to end.” —Ivy Pochoda, author of Sing Her Down
"Tod Goldberg's Gangsters Don't Die is one of the best books I've ever read. Gripping? Yes. Gonzo-violent. Uh huh. Stuffed just right with pathos and hope, humor and despair, this story about a rabbi-slash-hitman aims for your head and explodes in your heart." —Rachel Howzell Hall, bestselling author of We Lie Here and These Toxic Things
“Only thing better than the smell of napalm in the morning is the heavy rain of body parts Tod Goldberg gives us here. That includes the heart, on every page of this conclusion to the Gangsterland series. I want Sal Cupertine to be my spiritual advisor now, please.” —Stephen Graham Jones, author of Don’t Fear the Reaper
“Gangsters Don't Die is a highwire act of plot and character, filled with criminals whose deadpan sense of humor and willingness to kill for family, always for family, exists alongside the voice of Sal Cupertine, hitman turned rabbi, offering advice on belief and loyalty through the sage counsel of the Talmud. I found myself thinking all day about families, and love, at the heart of a thriller with the most inventive ways to describe killing I've read in a long, long time. Just stunning.” —Susan Straight, author of Mecca and In the Country of Women
“Gangsters Don’t Die is a thrilling and sometimes hilarious exploration of the myth and the lie and the truth of The Life. A distillation of the gangster's code (hint: there really isn't one) and the Code we adopt as we find the lines in our lives we can't cross. It’s Death of a Salesman meets The Irishman with more laughs. I loved every minute of it." —S.A. Cosby, bestselling author of Razorblade Tears and Blacktop Wasteland
“Tod Goldberg writes like a skilled knifeman—he knows how to slice and how to stab, how to bleed you out fast or bleed you out slow. Gangsters Don’t Die shows how in the hands of a master, crime fiction can do anything: scare you, touch you, make you laugh, give you wisdom and Springsteen references (at the same time). A true pleasure to read.” —Jordan Harper, author of Everybody Knows
2023-07-13
In the third and final installment of Goldberg's sardonic series about a prolific Chicago hit man posing as a Las Vegas rabbi, the mobster's dual identity begins to fall apart.
His surgically altered face pulverized by a sucker punch at a bar mitzvah, Sal Cupertine's disguise as Rabbi David Cohen is badly compromised. Bizarrely, he now resembles his former self, even under a beard. With FBI agents present and past gunning for him, along with old adversary Peaches Pocotillo, the new Native American head of the Chicago mob, he needs all the protection he can get. After Peaches burns down Sal's house in the Windy City and has ousted Family boss Ronnie Cupertine's wife and kids cut up and left in trash bags, Sal fears for the safety of his long unseen family, in protective custody somewhere. He once flirted with moral uplift after reading and quoting the Torah to become a passable rabbi: "The longer he pretended to be a rabbi, the better at being a rabbi he became." But that was four years ago. Now asked whether he has any problem with killing, he says, "None at all." While Goldberg continues to redefine hard-boiled with his streaming profanity and ripe intellectualism, he and his protagonist seem to lose interest in Sal/David's split personality. The murderous rabbi's inability to do wrong with his adoring flock in Vegas speaks to today's moral climate, but the comedic sparks that made Gangsterland (2014), the first novel in the series, so entertaining are in short supply. A sprawling effort with gratuitous elements including a cadaver farm of embalmed heads and other body parts, this book misses the concision of Goldberg's brilliant collection, The Low Desert (2021).
An eventful but overstuffed finale.
