Luna de casino

by Peter Blauner

Para Anthony Russo, hijo de uno de los principales hampones de Atlantic City, las oportunidades de alejarse de una vida marcada por el crimen son cada vez más escasas. Todas sus empresas legales se han hundido debido a la crisis, y la presión de su padre para que entre en el negocio familiar es cada vez más apremiante. Pero Tony tiene un último as en la manga: un viejo campeón del mundo de boxeo decidido a regresar al cuadrilátero que podría hacerle ganar suficiente dinero como para escapar de su asfixiante entorno.
Sin embargo, la mafia y el mundillo del boxeo tienen una cosa en común: todos quieren sacar tajada. Y si quiere poder guiar a su luchador hasta la gran noche del combate en uno de los principales casinos de la ciudad, Tony se las tendrá que ver no sólo con todo tipo de promotores, policías y funcionarios corruptos, sino también con algo mucho peor: su propia familia. Siguiendo la estela de Gay Talese, Peter Blauner se anticipó en varios años con Luna de casino a fenómenos como Los Soprano y Boardwalk Empire en su descripción realista y completamente carente de glamour, pero no exenta de humor, de la mafia de Nueva Jersey, consiguiendo un retrato que oscila entre lo horripilante y lo hilarantemente mundano.

Genres: Fiction, Crime, Mystery, Pulp, Novels, Thriller, Noir

393 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1994

About the author

Peter Blauner (b. 1959) is the Edgar-winning, New York Times bestselling author of nine novels, including SLOW MOTION RIOT and THE INTRUDER. A native of New York City, he apprenticed under famed newspaper columnist Pete Hamill and first broke into print as a journalist for New York magazine. His books are detailed, character-driven crime novels that have attracted a devoted cult following. His newest novel, PICTURE IN THE SAND, due out in January 2023, is his first work of historical fiction.

Reviews

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Anthony Russo is the stepson of an Atlantic City mobster who desperately wants to get away from the family business despite his stepfather's wishes. To get out, he borrows a lot of money from a loanshark and backs an aging boxer's comeback. Meanwhile, the feds are getting close to the family's operation, led by a local cop affectionately called Pigfucker. Anthony soon learns that the lady wrestler he's begun having an affair with isn't half as sleazy as the world of professional boxing...

I really wanted to dislike this book when I got it in the mail as part of the Hard Case Crime book club. It's got a few strikes against it already. It's bigger than most Hard Cases by fifty pages. The cover is good but not great. It's from a weird time period. Most Hard Cases are pre-1977 or originals just for the club. This one's from 1994. And it isn't written by Lawrence Block or Donald Westlake.

So why do I like it? It's a good story, that's why. Anthony's trapped in a life he can't stand and is feeling desperate. It's not so hard to see why he makes the choices he makes, even though they're the wrong ones. The battle between family loyalty and going legit weighs on him through the whole story. The violence, when it happens, is on the gruesome side and not pretty at all, especially the boxing match at the end. The line "Something's wrong. I can move my jaw with my tongue." immediately comes to mind.

I recommend this to all Hard Case fans, as well as fans of mobster stories and the Sopranos. Michael Imperioli would make a great Anthony Russo.

[Paul Bryant · Rating 4 out of 5]

From My Cousin Vinny :

MonaLisa Vito : Well I hate to bring it up because I know you've got enough pressure on you already. But, we agreed to get married as soon as you won your first case. Meanwhile, TEN YEARS LATER, my niece, the daughter of my sister is getting married. My biological clock is [taps her foot] TICKING LIKE THIS and the way this case is going, I ain't never getting married.

Vinny Gambini: Lisa, I don't need this. I swear to God, I do not need this right now, okay? I've got a judge that's just aching to throw me in jail. An idiot who wants to fight me for two hundred dollars. I got slaughtered pigs. I got giant loud whistles. I ain't slept in five days. I got no money, a dress code problem, AND a little murder case which, in the balance, holds the lives of two innocent kids. Not to mention your [taps his foot] BIOLOGICAL CLOCK. My career, your life, our marriage, and let me see, what else can we PILE ON? Is there any more SHIT we can pile on to the top of the outcome of this case? Is it possible?

Lisa: [pause] Maybe it was a bad time to bring it up.

Now that's what you call a MOMENT OF MAXIMUM TENSION which is a phrase that came out of a holiday I once had. We went to Minorca with Jane and Russell, another couple. We both had 5 year old daughters at the time. So we were late getting to the airport going back. Helen and Russell went off to return the hire car and me and Jane were left at the check in with a MOUNTAIN of luggage and two excited 5 year old kids. And Jane and Russell just… didn't come back for what seemed like hours. This was just before everyone had a mobile phone, which would have solved the problem – why weren't they invented sooner? Anyway, they were so long that we were the only people left to check in and we couldn't until they came back - they had the passports! - and they were just not there. And the check in lady said "We're closing this station in ten minutes" which would mean we're missing the flight. So Jane got really stressed and went marching off to find a Spanish phone & phone the hire company which was an expedition unlikely to bring forth much relief, I thought. So then they were gone and now she was gone and the two little kids running around screaming and me trying to control the luggage mountain and making sure Georgia and Milly didn't injure themselves or hide somewhere amusing and the check in lady saying "We WILL be closing in FIVE minutes, sir" – so that was my

MOMENT OF MAXIMUM TENSION

Of course at FOUR minutes to go, Helen & Russell breezed around the corner languidly ambling towards the mountain of luggage, and saying hey, what's the problem, you look a little frazzled. Sorry we got held up. Where's Jane?

In Casino Moon, thirtyish Anthony Russo is the son of a made guy who is wanting to live a straight life but getting nowhere with his straight contracting business in Atlantic City. His marriage is on the rocks. He already owes 50 grand to the boss of his father's mafia crew. He's trying to get out from under by promoting a big boxing contest, but he has to borrow another 50 grand to get that set up. Around about the same time, his dad's crew knocks off some rival gangster and Anthony gets dragged into a situation in regards to the son of the deceased, who he knows, and who thinks Anthony was the shooter. Which he wasn't, but his father has put it about that he was, because his father, bless his little gangster socks, is trying to get Anthony made, which he doesn't want to be. So Anthony and this son have a beef and the son ends up dead under the famous Atlantic City boardwalk, because in this instance, Anthony did in fact perform the transaction. In the middle of this he's met a considerable female wrestler who may be – are you laughing? don't laugh, she's good, she could snap your arm like a twig, but she's real sexy too – who may be the one true love of his entire miserable life. At the point when Anthony finds out Richie Amato has been picked up by the police who have found the disgustingly blood drenched clothes of Larry DiGregorio in his trunk, Anthony experiences a MOMENT OF MAXIMUM TENSION.

But it isn't actually the maximum. It just seems like the maximum at the time. In time he gets to the real maximum moment.

This is a great crime novel which is like a slice of the Sopranos before they existed. Recommended.

[Robert · Rating 4 out of 5]

If the boxing world even remotely mimics what Peter Blauner describes with intense detail in the pages of CASINO MOON—a world filled with intimidation and manipulation, where the main objective becomes the knockout, completely immobilizing your opponent both inside and outside the ring, where a cutting board with several large knives serves as the negotiation table, where greed is the only concept that brings men together in the name of a twelve round beat down—then I’m glad I’m a lover, not a fighter. It’s this world filled with ornate detail, where the good guys are bad and the bad guys are even worse that the reader finds himself engrossed in from the opening bell. A world where women go panty-free, fucking the hero on the rails of the boardwalk, where killing is just another word expunged between breaths and guns are touted around with as much precision as metal lunchboxes. It’s a world I’m unfamiliar with, and yet I was immediately intrigued by it.

This world has no beginning and no end: it lives on with its own life force. And yet I felt as though I had a brief glimpse into it between the pages, savoring every moment of exploding flesh, hard rights, and intense uppercuts. While I certainly understood the needs and desires of Anthony Russo and his ploy to go legitimate, or at least break himself away from his mob ties, most of my sympathies rested with Rosemary. She’s as tough as any male character that haunts the pages of this novel, and without her, this book might have been a shell of itself. This proves an ongoing point that many good and great authors recognize: strong males need strong females. It’s a codependent relationship, and this hard-case crime novel is better for it.

If you’re into interesting reads where you get a glimpse of the street life, along with the high life, and you’re not afraid to get your hands dirty, then you might want to check out this book. I know I’m glad I did.

Cross-posted at Robert's Reads

[James Thane · Rating 3 out of 5]

Anthony Russo is both the son and the adopted son of minor Atlantic City mobsters in a family headed by his wife's uncle. Anthony's "uncle" and stepfather both expect him to go into the business and become an "earner." His stepfather even hopes that Anthony will become a made man, in spite of the fact that he isn't strictly qualified under the ancient rules that govern these things.

Anthony, though, has dreams of his own. He longs to escape the mob life and become a legitimate businessman. Unhappily, though, he's not the sharpest tool in the box and he's weighted down by any number of bad decisions that he's made along the way, including his marriage and the fact that he's borrowed large sums of money from his "uncle." Anthony sees his opportunity by jumping into the fight game--about which he knows nothing--and managing an aging, run-down fighter who's hoping to make a comeback. Anthony hopes to clear enough money from the venture to pay his debts and emerge as a free man, responsibly only to himself. To do so, though, he will have to clear any number of very high hurdles.

This is another book from the Hard Case Crime series, which is a series that I really like a lot. I was not all that knocked out about this book, though. My principal problem was that I could not find any character that I cared enough about to root for. Even Anthony, the main protagonist, struck me as a relatively clueless jerk from the git-go, and I frankly didn't care if he managed to escape from the mob life or not. This is a guy who made one stupid decision after another, digging himself deeper into the hole rather than out of it, and for me at least, he was totally unsympathetic.

There was one fairly strong, interesting, albeit still-flawed character--a female mud wrestler named Rosemary. I did want to see her escape from this miserable world, but that wasn't enough to save the book for me. It was an OK read, but certainly not one of my favorite HCC books.

[Josh · Rating 4 out of 5]

A Casino Moon: 'I looked up and saw there was a half moon hanging over Bally's Grand [a casino]. It was what I used to call a casino moon, because the yellow casino sign was so bright, the moon looked cheap and unimpressive by comparison.'


Casino Moon packs a punch both in crisp dialogue and hard hitting story telling, with each chapter sure to bruise and batter your imagination. Anthony - a good guy in the world of goodfellas is married to the niece of a mob boss and trying to make a living on the right side of the law. Of course having an adopted father who happens to be the boss' right hand man doesn't help matters. Not one to shy from opportunities, he hitches a ride on the back of a washed up has-been boxer on the comeback trail for one last fight. Seeing this as his ticket to independence and a way to disassociate himself from his mafia ties (albeit half ties), he rolls the dice and lets it ride, knowing he's staked everything on one bet - the fall of the cards likely to determine if money or breathing is to be his biggest concern.

Blauner's tale of a man seeking the straight and narrow while navigating across rough and rocky terrain is a joy to read. This was more of wrong man tale rather than crime with mafia connotations - the Soprano-esque backdrop paled to Anthony's scheme and hard-done-by life. That being said, there were hits, bar room brawls, dames, and bribery - all the hallmarks of a classic mob piece with a hint of police corruption thrown in for that added spice of noir. 4 stars.

[Jake · Rating 4 out of 5]

I collect Hard Case Crime books as a hobby. I love crime novels and I love the simplicity of HCC works: nothing pretentious, just good ol’ fashioned pulp fiction. However, I’m really bad at reading what I collect. I think I take it for granted that these books may be around for awhile and that, unlike most books I purchase, I’m not giving them up. So I only read about two a year in a collection of sixty or so.

One of the great things about library summer reading challenges is how they encourage me to read things in my library that may otherwise be sitting for awhile. When of the challenges said to read a book with “moon” in the title, I figured it was time, at last, to check this one out even though it was relatively low on the list of HCC ones I want to read.

And oh man, what a gem this is.

I don’t know much about Atlantic City. I know that it was a gangster and tourist paradise through the 20s and 30s, went to seed, was resurrected by the casinos, and has apparently gone to seed again. This takes place in the mid-90s, when the casinos were still booming and everyone was having a good time.

Well, everyone except the natives, some of whom worked for the mob. And that’s where our story begins.

This is a good crime novel that functions as a time capsule for a city where the residents can’t seem to get a piece of the fool’s gold everyone else wants. It was at once thrilling (I was glued to the last page), educational, and deep. Blauner cares about his characters and it shows. What starts out as a familiar “escaping the life” tale becomes something more. I was annoyed with all the characters and yet invested in their arcs. All the while, Atlantic City looms in the background as the book’s biggest character.

If you’re interested in checking out the Hard Case Crime series, this is as good of a book to start as any. The theme of many HCC novels is how lowlifes and never-wases get their chance. Tough to see how that can be done better than it is here.

[Neil McCrea · Rating 4 out of 5]

Anthony Russo was born into the mob, he married into the mob, and he owes his college education and construction job to the mob. Now his step-father and father-in-law would like to see some return on their investment in him, but after losing his biological father to mob infighting and seeing the desperate scrabbling for position/money/respect that even the most successful members of the local crew engage in, Anthony wants out.

After striking up an acquaintance with a former boxing champion looking to make a comeback, Anthony jumps at the chance to go straight by becoming his manager. Legit or not, the boxing game is its own sort of hustle and Anthony soon finds himself being looked at by the law and even further in debt to the family. Can he make enough money in his new venture fast enough to prevent his whole house of cards from collapsing in on itself?

Casino Moon is a different sort of beast than most of Hard Case's catalog. It is not a hidden gem or posthumous work from a genre master, nor is it a new bit of noir from an up and comer. Rather it is an overlooked piece from the recent past by an underrated mid-lister. Casino Moon is also relentless in its puncturing of any glamour associated with organized crime.

The novel opens with a fight between two elderly mob members. What should have been a quick and easy hit, devolves into a pathetic tooth and nail struggle for survival on the floor of a strip club. Guns, knives, dentures, and hairpieces all rattle around until one of the men emerges victorious. This scene hovers over the rest of the book as the unspoken truth about the nature of Cosa Nostra. Most mob members are depicted as mean spirited, lazy parasites, scorning hard working "civilians" and endlessly dreaming about living easy on one scam or another. The "life of luxury" lived by the boss of the local crew is really nothing more than a monstrous display of gluttony to the exclusion of anything else. Hollow aphorisms about respect, loyalty, and family are endlessly repeated but ultimately never believed in even by those who cling to them the most.

Anthony isn't a particularly likable character, but his desire to change and willingness to make it happen easily has the audience rooting for him. The novel puts us on an ethical roller coaster as we watch Anthony regularly compromise his newfound principles in the hope of eventually living a better life. Anthony's struggles are regularly contrasted with the cop, Pig Fucker's. Pig Fucker is ostensibly on the side of law & order, but his methods and motives are generally loathsome. Yet, for every time we groan about one of Anthony's compromises in the service of an ephemeral future good, we see Pig Fucker doing a concrete minor good despite his venal nature.

The women in Casino Moon are better represented than in many Hard Case offerings. Anthony's wife, Carla, was his childhood sweetheart and they bonded in faux rebellion against the restrictions of their criminal families. When Anthony took family money to start his construction business, Carla resigned herself to living under the family thumb "as long as it was the two of them against the world". For Anthony, she becomes a symbol of the life he's trying to escape from, and when he distances himself from her and cheats on her, we feel for Carla even as she attempts to bring him back to the mob. Anthony's mistress, Rosemary, is possibly the strongest character in the book. A single mother, former prostitute, sometime stripper, professional wrestler and eventual boxing ring girl. There is genuine emotion to be found as they forgive each other's dark pasts and make plans to build a more secure future together. This makes the inevitable betrayal all the more upsetting.

Casino Moon may be my favorite of all the Hard Case titles I've read so far. Written just a few short years before the debut of the Sopranos, it often feels like a lost season of that show, and I mean that in the best possible way.

[Dave · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hard Case Crime has hit another home run. Casino Moon by Peter Blauner is Blauner's second novel, originally published in 1994 and now re-published by Hard Case Crime. Blauner has written six or seven novels and has written and produced for the Law and Order television series.

This is a story about Anthony Russo, born into the mob. His father, Michael, was killed early in Anthony's life and his father's closest friend, Vin, has been his surrogate father for much of his life in Atlantic City. Vin is the right hand man of the fat greedy local mob boss and he wants to see Anthony become a "made man." Although Anthony is not one hundred percent Sicilian, Vin is hoping that an exception can be made. Anthony doesn't want to be involved in the mob. He doesn't want to take orders, pick up envelopes, or knock off enemies. Vin is so convinced Anthony will succeed in the family business, he never stops talking him up even when the boss is convinced Anthony can't pull the trigger.

Of course, marrying the mob boss's niece didn't help any. Nor did borrowing $60,000 from the boss to provide for his family. Anthony can't pay him back and can't lift his family out of poverty by making a legitimate living. And, his wife is unhappy and bitter about it. She married him because she thought he was a good guy, not because she took a vow of poverty.

Anthony stumbles on a scheme by which he can pay back what he owes and get a grubstake up to start a respectable life. His friend has a brother who was a former middleweight champ a decade earlier, but is now a washed-up has-been who barely survives a sparring match in the local gym. Anthony is going to get Elijah on the headline bill at the local casino and reap twenty percent of the take. He thinks he is going to make an honest living and escape the criminal life.

Along the way, he meets a gal who works as a bikini wrestler in a bar, a step up from working the street corners for her. The boss warns him that if he steps out on the boss's niece, he'll find himself missing quite a few body parts.

Anthony's got the mob after him, his crazy wife after him, the police who think he offed a couple of local hoods, and, to make matters worse, he's in debt up to his eyeballs to the local loan shark to finance his boxer, the nearly-geriatric punching bag.

The story is well-written and, despite its 300-page length, can be read in an evening. Blauner has the street language down and you feel Anthony's frustration as he is trapped in a maze he can't get out of. It is not simply a bang-bang shoot-em-up story either, but a great character study of Anthony. Highly recommended crime fiction reading. Thumbs up.

[Stephen J. Golds · Rating 5 out of 5]

WOW!!
What a stupendous crime novel this is.
Atlantic City
The Mob
Casinos
Boxing
An underdog story that has it all.
Unlikable but memorable characters. Well written and paced. Twists, turns and edgy as hell.
I really loved this novel and wish it had a sequel.
Will be checking out Blauner’s other work ASAP
5/5

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

Maybe it's because this book takes place in Atlantic City, but I felt a certain closeness and affinity for the setting that I usually do not with crime novels. The ones that take place in New York City, for example, always seem to be in a New York that doesn't really exist, although with the city's size, I guess really that everything can exist there outside of one's own perception. This novel really feels like AC, in particular the beauty of the nature surrounding the city and its intersection with the depression of the people that live there.
And, as far as that goes, you can almost see where this novel is headed from the moment it really gets started. Everything starts off heading downhill, and, even as the character's schemes start to work out, you know they will go nowehere good. The characters here live in the world of No Exit, and the only thing is to see how everything is going to unravel.
The only character I think one feels any real sympathy for is the narrator's wife, though even there, she pushes him towards a criminal life, even as he tries to avoid it. His rejection of her, however, is one of the saddest scenes in the novel.
Anyway, sharp writing and a good story.

[Nathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Working man with mob connections (but no involvement) finds himself down on his luck in Atlantic City. He sees a chance to better himself, but digs himself into a hole.

This one started out slowly, but gradually (and successfully) picks up the tempo through the book. There are some unbelievable elements, and some of the plot points seem a little contrived, but overall the book successfully tells the tale and conjures the environment.

Workaday prose, but that fits the workaday characters and situations. The characters are rounded enough, though nobody will gain your sympathy.

Rated MA for some graphic violence, pervasive language, adult themes and moderate sex scenes. 3/5

Question: Why is Atlantic City always home to these sorts of stories? Does nothing good ever happen to anybody there?

[Annick Rodriguez · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a good boxing-themed story, although I don't usually like this setting as they are always predictable. The boxing angle is just a part of this story, which follow a young Italian guy who wants to break free from becoming part of the family "business" (think stereotypical "Goodfellas" characters from Atlantic City). Loved the character of the lady wrestler/stripper/hooker he befriends, and has an affair with. She has a strong survivor personality and she's a single mom struggling to make a better life for her daughter. The ending is not much of a surprise, but it was an enjoyable read.

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

*3.5*

[Craig Childs · Rating 4 out of 5]

Most Hard Case Crime reprints are pulp novels designed for fast easy reading, but sometimes editor Charles Ardai slips something different into the lineup. Peter Blauner’s 1994 sophomore novel is a slower paced affair that takes time to develop an intricate web of character relationships.

Anthony Russo is the son of a top lieutenant in the Atlantic City mafia, but he desperately wants to find a way to get free of their influence and go legit. His father, his wife, and his wife’s uncle all pressure him to get deeper into the life. In an effort to grab financial independence once and for all, Anthony seizes on a wild scheme to finance an aging ex-prizefighter in a boxing comeback bid. The biggest problem is that Anthony still thinks like a mobster, and his own rash decisions keep coming back to jeopardize his scheme.

This book is the result of several years of research into the history and politics of Atlantic City. I can almost imagine the author started the project thinking it would be the story of how organized crime infiltrated the casinos in the 1970’s, only to discover the casinos had in fact nearly run the Italian mob out of business. By the mid-90’s, the family bosses were barely hanging on amidst an economic recession and increased government prosecutions, which presents a milieu rich with irony and humor.

This novel is awash in interesting minor characters who outshine the rather predictable Anthony Russo. The book struggles, however, to find a consistent tone. The flailing mob scenes have an almost farcical quality, like something Elmore Leonard might have written. At other times, it seems like the book wants the feel of a more serious expose, especially those scenes that deliberately contrast mafia tactics with the blurred but legal ethics of professional boxing.

Another thing that hurts this novel--it came out five years before Sopranos. Blauner’s world may in fact be a more accurate depiction of turn-of-the-century New Jersey mafia, but it clashes with the perceptions created so strongly by the television show and James Gandolfino’s on-screen presence.

I really enjoyed Blauner’s writing style, and I would read more of his work. This book features some snippets of great prose. Here are some brief samples:

“Looking at them, you’d think the standard wasn’t how much jewelry they wore but how much plastic surgery they’d had... There were tit jobs, dye jobs, face lifts, hair plugs, people with the fat sucked out of their cheeks, cellulite scraped off their asses. You half expected a second division to come along, made up of the castoff parts.”

“There were stragglers out on the sidewalk in front of the 7-eleven. Hookers and low-level drug dealers mixing it up in the glare of the red and white sign. They weren’t human really. They were more like shadows of what other people wanted at midnight. You put a light on them and they’d disappear.”

[Louis · Rating 4 out of 5]

A dandy thriller from Hard Case Crime from Blauner when he was just getting started as a writer in the mid-1990s. His hero grew up in Atlantic City the stepson of a local Mafia man. He was told never to ask too many questions about what happened to his real father. When he tries to break into promoting boxing to pay off debts, he finds it impossible to separate himself from the local Cosa Nostra. Probably could have been shorter, especially in some of the conversations that reestablish Mafia rituals and characters we already know, but still a fun way to pass the time and a sign of better to come from Blauner.

[Steve · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book cracks me up. There is only character 2who could truly be considered a "good guy" -- and he is assigned what would normally be a bad guy role. This is aq funny crime novel: nobody is all that sympathetic but then too everybody is appreciably all-too-human. Read it if you think you'd enjoy a novel about small-time mobsters in Atlantic City. But its pleasure is tied to human failings.

[Nicolas · Rating 4 out of 5]

This ended up being a really good book, the style was very atypical to the things I normally like. It deals mostly with a guy born adjacent to the mob who spends his life trying to get away from it. I was hoping the boxing story elements would be a little more prominent, but regardless it was good solid read. It wasn't at all what I expected.

[Ted]

David Denby recommends him in 03/2012 New Yorker

[Joe · Rating 4 out of 5]

a little dated now, but realistic characters great plot

[Oli Turner · Rating 5 out of 5]

The fifty-fifth hard case crime novel done #casinomoon by #peterblauner originally published in 1994. Its the best HCC novel since fifty to one. It’s a bit longer than the average HCC novel but it has a fast pace, wit and great one liners. The characters all seem three dimensional with their own motivations. There is no deus ex machina or any happy endings. It seems pretty realistic. everyone gets screwed over one way or another except the bullshitters who already have all the money and power. Interesting narrative choices with some chapters being in the first person dealing with the protagonist and other chapters in the third person dealing with the side characters and how all their paths intersect and build to the bloody conclusion. It’s like a mix of the sopranos and the LA Noire boxing case.

[Glen U · Rating 2 out of 5]

At best, another mob book, interesting story and credibly written. At worst, another mob book, interesting story and credibly written. There have been hundreds of Mafia novels written since 1969 and Mario Puzo wrote his iconic best seller, "The Godfather." Some successful, some not. Most are like "Casino Moon", a fair read but not incredibly creative and not a literary masterpiece. For me, this book was extremely disappointing because Peter Blauner's debut novel, "Slow Motion Riot", an Edgar Award Winner, was both hugely inventive and far above average in its prose and plot. Hopefully, "Casino Moon" is just an anomaly and Blauner's subsequent novels once more show the talent that he is.

[barnabas barnabas]

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[Claudia · Rating 1 out of 5]

If I could give it a less rating I would. I am not a prude but the language in this book was so unnecessary that it ruined the book for me. I haven't read a book by this author and I probably will be very cautious of reading any of his others.

[George Landau-Pincus · Rating 2 out of 5]

Sort of unbearably bad, but I was telling a friend about it and then 15 minutes passed and I came to realizing I was still talking about it, and that’s gotta count for something. Painfully stupid protagonist and like two dozen characters to keep straight. Kinda fun.

[John Stanley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Basically, just a story about a bunch of east coast mobsters trying to get through life. It wasn't a bad book, just nothing all that special and a bunch of characters that I found it difficult to care all that much for.

[Michael Burkett · Rating 1 out of 5]

Couldn't stand any of main characters.

[Pat Wagner · Rating 5 out of 5]

Terrific book.

[Jacob Dzik · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my favorite mob books.

[Jeremy Newton · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an excellent noir crime novel. Compelling, well written and very dark. If you like the genre, I think you'll enjoy this.

[Bob Box · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read in 2006. A gritty novel with integrity and style.