The main character, Joe Coughlin, starts his career as a criminal in Boston from one of the most powerful groups of the Italian mafia, dedicated to smuggling and drug trafficking. He builds a great fortune and is considered a great businessman dedicated to seemingly legal businesses. When the United States enters World War II, the American government hires shipping networks that end up being controlled by the mafia and where the protagonist does a lot of business. But the Mafia has different gangs and they fight each other. A spiral of violence is unleashed between them. The story is inspired by real events and reflects the cynicism of the mafiosi who claim to be based on a regulation that they themselves have created but resort to crime as a problem-solving system. The author describes with realism the environments and situations in which the story takes place, sometimes with a harsh and obscene language. Of great narrative quality and with characters very well outlined and recognizable by the reader. Dennis Lehane (USA, 1965) is a successful author of crime novel , who with this book completes his trilogy centred on Joe Coughlin, an image of the American gangster of the mid-twentieth century.