Review

Who Is Lou Sciortino?

By Ottavio Cappellani

Published by Picador

Metropolitan Catania, and Tony's barbecues are a neighbourhood sensation. Each weekend the party girls rub shoulders with elegant Mafiosi - and no wonder, since Tony's uncle Sal runs the local show.

When a policeman is shot in uncle Mimmo's shop, it isn't your ordinary murder. Lou Sciortino - gin and tonic in hand, newly arrived from his safe job laundering mob money in New York - finds more in the Old Country than he'd bargained for.

This is sunny Sicily, where no one is truly anyone's friend, killers have sidelines in amaretti, the nicest people can still bring on the apocalypse, and grandfathers are to be feared above all men.

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Translator: Howard Curtis