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FRANK COSTELLO - A NOVEL
RONALD K. FRIED
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ALL INFORMATION IN THIS POST IS COURTESY OF JENNIFER MUSICO, BOOK AND AUTHOR PUBLICITY - JENNIFERMUSICO.COM
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In 1951, TV was a new medium and it was the first time in America that a
congressional hearing was televised.
Americans who didn’t own TV sets
flocked to movie theaters to watch the Kekauver committee as it
investigated organized crime.
Why would Frank Cosetello, acting head of
what is now called the Genovese Crime family, choose to testify in
public when most other mobsters just took the Fifth?
As a result of
Costello’s decision, his lifelong lies and criminality were displayed
for the whole country to see.
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December 1, 2022
SUNY Press/Excelsior Editions
PRAISE FOR FRANK COSTELLO - A NOVEL:
"This book crackles with the same energy I felt when I prosecuted
real-life mobsters in New York—the cinematic personalities, the
whip-sharp dialogue, the humor, and the ever-present sense of menace.
Some mob books and movies are cartoonish, but not this one. Frank
Costello: A Novel is fiction, but it's also genuine, the real deal. It
could only be told by somebody who has studied the life and truly
understands all that it reveals about mobsters, and about ourselves." —
Elie Honig, CNN Senior Legal Analyst and author of Hatchet Man: How
Bill Barr Broke the Prosecutor's Code and Corrupted the Justice
Department
"Frank Costello's raspy-voiced tale is rendered
with unmitigable brio by Ron Fried in this deeply researched and
evocative novel, which rivals E.L. Doctorow's masterpiece, Billy
Bathgate. I cannot laud this book enough." — J. Michael Lennon, author, Norman Mailer: A Double Life
"A brilliant work of fiction by a man who knows the true story of the mob inside out." — Kevin Baker, author of The Big Crowd
"I loved this chilling, crackling yarn that feels like an inside job." — Robert Lipsyte, author and former New York Times columnist
"There
is more truth about Costello in this historical novel than many
'nonfiction' histories of Cosa Nostra. A terrifically fun read for mob
history aficionados." — Alex Hortis, author of The Mob and the City: The Hidden History of How the Mafia Captured New York
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ABOUT FRANK COSTELLO - A NOVEL:
In Frank Costello, A Novel, Fried weaves a historically accurate
tale in Costello's imagined, bitter, streetwise voice. As Frank Costello
looks back over his life as head of the most powerful crime family in
America, he doesn't focus on the triumphs of his bootlegging empire, his
nationwide gambling network, or his de facto control of Tammany Hall.
Instead, Costello—the politically connected "Prime Minister of the
Underworld"—remembers the lies he's told, the mistakes he's made, and
his fateful decision to testify before the televised Kefauver hearings
investigating organized crime in America.
The novel reaches its
climax as Costello—in a naïve attempt to preserve the patina of
respectability he's spent his life creating—tries to defend himself
before senators out to expose the full extent of the Mafia's reach. The
result is a humiliating, very public lesson about who holds the real
power in America.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Ronald K. Fried is a writer and television producer. Fried is a
frequent contributor to The Daily Beast where he's written about
everything from Honoré de Balzac, Elizabeth Hardwick, and Martin Amis to
Trump, boxing, and the Mafia. His writing has also appeared in The New
York Times, Newsday, The Millions, and The Norman Mailer Review. He
contributed a chapter to Norman Mailer in Context (Cambridge University
Press).
Fried's television credits include producing
shows for Dick Cavett, Tina Brown, and Alec Baldwin. During his long
association with Cavett, Fried produced shows with writers such as Saul
Bellow, August Wilson,Gore Vidal, and John Cheever and John Updike (in a
joint appearance), as well as Richard Pryor, Jean-Luc Godard, Billy
Joel, and many others. He's been a writer and producer on series for
PBS, AMC, History, USA, Amazon, and Netflix. He also produced Tina
Brown's video interviews with Philip Roth, Ian McEwan, and David Remnick
for The Daily Beast.
As Vice President and Executive
Producer at MetroTV, a division of Rainbow Media (now AMC Networks),
Fried earned five New York Emmy Awards and multiple nominations for a
series shot entirely in the New York City subway system and coverage of
New York's Fashion week. Production of Two Mailers, Fried's play about
Norman Mailer and his son, John Buffalo Mailer, has been postponed owing
to the pandemic.
Fried graduated from Columbia
University where he won the Bennet Cerf story competition and the
Cornell Woolrich Fellowship as outstanding undergraduate fiction writer.
He was a 2010 Fellow at the Norman Mailer Writers Colony. He is
married to the writer Lorraine Kreahling. They live in New York
City.Fried is a member of PEN America and the Authors Guild.
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ReplyDeleteThanks for stopping.