The Last Don

by Mario Puzo

Overview

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

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780345412218
Publisher:	Random House Publishing Group
Publication date:	01/29/1997
Edition description:	Reissue
Pages:	512
Sales rank:	53,926
Product dimensions:	4.15(w) x 6.82(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

The son of Italian immigrants who moved to the Hell’s Kitchen area of New York City, Mario Puzo was born on October 15, 1920. After World War II, during which he served as a U.S. Army corporal, he attended City College of New York on the G.I. Bill and worked as a freelance writer. During this period he wrote his first two novels, The Dark Arena and The Fortunate Pilgrim.When his books made little money despite being critically acclaimed, he vowed to write a bestseller. The Godfather was an enormous success. He collaborated with director Francis Ford Coppola on the screenplays for all three Godfather movies and won Academy Awards for both The Godfather and The Godfather, Part II. He also collaborated on the scripts for such films as Superman, Superman II, and The Cotton Club. He continued to write phenomenally successful novels, including Fools Die, The Sicilian, The Fourth K, and The Last Don. Mario Puzo died on July 2, 1999. His final novel, Omerta, was published in 2000.

Date of Birth:

October 15, 1920

Date of Death:

July 2, 1999

Place of Birth:

New York City

Place of Death:

Bay Shore, Long Island

Education:

Attended New York City's New School for Social Research and Columbia University

Read an Excerpt

CHAPTER 1
(Continues…)

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Excerpted from "The Last Don"
by .
Copyright © 1997 Mario Puzo.
Excerpted by permission of Random House Publishing Group.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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Editorial Reviews

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

From the Publisher

Twenty-five years after the publication of The Godfather, Puzo returns to the literary landscape that launched his career and led to several wildly successful movies. Don Domenico Clericuzio has managed to outlast competing Mafia families while leading the Clericuzio clan to prominence. Pippi, the Don's nephew, along with son Cross, heads the family's Las Vegas operations, where he seeks to extend the Clericuzio tentacles into such legitimate pursuits as legalized gambling, motion pictures, and the construction industry. When Pippi is murdered, Cross seeks vengeance but finds the trail leading ever closer to home. This long abridgmentfour cassettes instead of the usual twodoes the novel justice by retaining much of Puzo's original material. Joe Montegna's reading is appropriately low-key. Recommended for most popular collections.Mark Annichiarico, "Library Journal"

Library Journal

Puzo's latest novel is a version of the Wars of the Roses within a Mafia context. That fifteenth-century English dynastic struggle for the throne saw cousin pitted against cousin, and Puzo has fashioned the same kind of internecine struggle here. The story opens in 1965, with Don Clericuzio, head of the most powerful Mafia family in the country, deciding to make his enterprises legit. He is looking ahead to his grandchildren's lives, wanting them to enjoy his largesse without the danger inherent in life in the criminal underworld. Zoom--we're transported to the present day and involved in how the don's plans for his family's future are playing out. Hollywood and Las Vegas provide venues for one grandson's attempts, at the expense of another grandson, to undermine the master plan, but all's well that ends well in this surefire best-seller.

Brad Hooper