Five Families: The Rise, Decline, and Resurgence of America's Most Powerful Mafia Empires

Selwyn Raab

May 2014 · Sold by Macmillan

About this ebook

The New York Times bestseller chronicling the history of NYC’s infamous five mafia families is now the basis for the upcoming The HISTORY® Channel documentary series American Godfathers: The Five Families.

Genovese, Gambino, Bonnano, Colombo and Lucchese. For decades these Five Families ruled New York and built the American Mafia (or Cosa Nostra) into an underworld empire. Today, the Mafia is an endangered species, battered and beleaguered by aggressive investigators, incompetent leadership, betrayals and generational changes that produced violent and unreliable leaders and recruits. A twenty year assault against the five families in particular blossomed into the most successful law enforcement campaign of the last century.

Selwyn Raab's Five Families is the vivid story of the rise and fall of New York's premier dons from Lucky Luciano to Paul Castellano to John Gotti and more. The book also brings the reader right up to the possible resurgence of the Mafia as the FBI and local law enforcement agencies turn their attention to homeland security and away from organized crime.

Ratings and reviews

For anyone that likes historical content this is perfect. The Mafia has an interesting and important spot in American history and this book shows it. This is the mob inside and out.

I have seen Selwyn Raab in literally every mafia documentary as an expert and his book proves this fact. This is the five family Bible for anyone wanting to learn the history of the New York Mafia. A great read by an amazingly articulate an knowledgeable author.

A must have for anyone wanting to know how the mafia works and how it was brought down. No book comes close to this!

About the author

Since 1974, Selwyn Raab has been a reporter for The New York Times and has won dozens of awards for his coverage of the Mafia. He's appeared countless times on both local and national news shows and in documentaries about the Mafia for the History Channel and A&E. More than a newsman he is also something of a crusader, having played an important role in exposing fabricated testimony surrounding the conviction of Rubin "Hurricane" Carter. Raab is also the author of Justice in the Back Room which was the basis for the legendary "Kojak" television series and the very successful Mob Lawyer, which shed new light on who killed Jimmy Hoffa and JFK.