Donnie Brasco

In this case, I saw the film before I read the book, and if I’m going to call myself an honest man, I’d have to say I enjoyed the film more than the book.

Still, the book struck me as a great read because it embraced and portrayed the extraordinary amount of tension an undercover agent deals with 24/7. I mean, when you’re trying to make an arrest undercover, you’re two people at the same time, but you’d better not mess up and let anyone know you are or it’s game over—and very probably, bang-bang, pal, you’re history.

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Donnie Brasco follows FBI agent Joseph D. Pistone’s six-year infiltration into the Mafia.

Posing as a street-level jewel thief, Pistone provides a bottoms-up look into the underbelly of the Brooklyn Bonanno’s in Brooklyn, from the family’s epicenter in pre-gentrified Williamsburg and Greenpoint. This rank-and-file rundown shines a harsh light on the petty lives of street soldiers and their conniving capos in their natural habitat, from scrounging for scraps in wood-paneled clubhouses to lording over their turf from pigeon-cooped rooftops.

In fact, the juxtaposition of setting, in flipping between sinister South Brooklyn and sizzling South Florida, is a masterful use of… show more.

Donnie Brasco: My Undercover Life in the Mafia is the autobiographical account of Joseph Pistone’s infiltration of a branch of the Colombo crime family. Pistone, an FBI Special Agent, spent six harrowing years as a member of the family, going by the name Donnie Brasco. The book was turned into the movie Donnie Brasco, starring Johnny Depp.

Unlike other books that deal with organized crime, this one is extraordinarily chilling because it is written in the words of an undercover agent, who knew that, at any given moment, his identity could have been revealed, which would have led to… show more.

Published in 1988, Detective Joe Pistone is ordered to go underground to pose as a criminal and infiltrate a mob family. With his new name, Donnie Brasco, and made-up background as a jewel thief, his behavior and style are so authentic to the small-time street thugs, he is accepted almost immediately. His life is always in jeopardy and his family suffers since he is away all the time, but he is so good at playing the bad guy, Pistone begins to feel sympathy for the mobsters he is looking to arrest. The book reveals how petty and incompetent mobsters are.… show more.

First, full disclosure: Joe Pistone, aka, Donnie Brasco is a close friend and former FBI Agent partner. That is not why I’m recommending his book. It is a can’t-put-me-down, high suspense true story of his six year undercover infiltration of the Mafia. His life was in constant jeopardy and took its toll on his family, but they remained together. Joe’s work resulted in 200 criminal federal indictments of mob members and six execution-style murders of those who allowed him to penetrate their ranks. He left the mob with a five hundred thousand dollar mafia price tag on his head and… show more.