Excellent Cadavers: The Mafia and the Death of the First Italian Republic

New
Paperback
1996
$14.25

Excellent Cadavers (a term used in Sicily to distinguish the assassination of prominent government officials from the hundreds of common criminals killed in the course of routine mafia business) tells of the remarkable investigation spearheaded by Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, the two Sicilian prosecutors who in the 1980s took the war against the Mafia further than anyone had ever dared. In 1992, aware that the two magistrates were without the complete support of the Italian government, the Mafia assassinated them. In death they were hailed as national heroes; the massive public outcry demanded their investigations be completed. The outcome: the toppling of crucial alliances that had forged political rule in Italy since WWII and the criminal indictment of Italy's most prominent leaders.

Synopsis

Excellent Cadavers (a term used in Sicily to distinguish the assassination of prominent government officials from the hundreds of common criminals killed in the course of routine mafia business) tells of the remarkable investigation spearheaded by Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, the two Sicilian prosecutors who in the 1980s took the war against the Mafia further than anyone had ever dared. In 1992, aware that the two magistrates were without the complete support of the Italian government, the Mafia assassinated them. In death they were hailed as national heroes; the massive public outcry demanded their investigations be completed. The outcome: the toppling of crucial alliances that had forged political rule in Italy since WWII and the criminal indictment of Italy's most prominent leaders.

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More Information

Format: Paperback
Pages: 480
Edition: New e.
Publisher: Vintage
Published: 06 Jun 1996
ISBN 10: 0099594919
ISBN 13: 9780099594918
Book Overview: A true crime classic: the brutal account of the battle to destroy the modern-day mafia

Media Reviews

A fascinating and horrifying book -- Denis Mack Smith * New York Times *
As good as non-fiction books get: it is crammed with detail and analysis, but reads like a novel -- Marc Babej * Guardian *
The very best on the modern mafia - brilliantly and thoughtfully telling a complex and messy tale... The characterisation and the twists of the plot have the deft touch of a novelist -- Robert Fox * Sunday Telegraph *
Totally absorbing and distinctly chilling -- Barry Unsworth * Evening Standard, Books of the Year *
Diligently researched and fluently written -- Diego Gambetta * Independent *

Author Bio

Alexander Stille's first book, Benevolence and Betrayal: Five Italian Jewish Families Under Fascism, was chosen by the Time Literary Supplement as one of the best books of 1992, and received the Los Angeles Times Book Award for history. Since Excellent Cadavers he has written The Future of the Past and The Sack of Rome: How a Beautiful European Country with a Fabled History and a Storied Culture Was Taken Over by a Man Named Silvio Berlusconi. He has written for the Boston Globe, the New York Review of Books, the New York Times, the Toronto Globe & Mail and the New Yorker. He is also the San Paolo Professor of International Journalism at Columbia. Stille lives in New York.