Author(s): Russell Shorto

BIOGRAPHY

Best-selling author Russell Shorto grew up knowing that his grandfather and namesake was a small-town mobster, but was bound by an unspoken, family vow of silence. Then a distant cousin prodded him: You gotta write about it. In Small-time, Shorto travels back to postwar America and the brawny factory town of Johnstown, Pennsylvania, where Russ and his brother-in-law, "Little Joe," operate a gambling empire and effectively run the town. The result is a "beautifully rendered, spellbinding saga" (Shelf Awareness), an intimate story of a mobster and his wife, sudden riches, and the toll a lawless life takes on one family. Book jacket.