Son of Murder, Inc: Man in a Cassock

Rating:
Summary: A Junior Version of Murder,Inc.
Review: This novel should be entitled Murder,Inc Jr.,for that is what it is.And-it is just as gripping as the senior account of the murders for hire which sold 30 million copies,I have been told,and is still in print.As a resident of Brooklyn in the Forties,this novel revivifies the rivetting trial and conviction of assassins for profit;and,the political fallout to congressional levels.Although we are reading a novel,nonetheless it captures the documentary glare and raw notoriety in fictional guise as it closely shadows the actual events. What is amazing in the novel is the sheer virtuosity of the structure of the trail,the exquisiate turns about points of law,the psychological depths,and the superb quality of dialogues of give and take in the drama of the trial.Characterizations are memorable beginning with Matthew,Father Campion, down the lowly tenants and bums of a Brownsville tenement.From the adroit opening scene to the last surprises at the ending,I became an instant fan of thei novelist upm to the final dismissal of a double frame up of father and son.ely absorbing as Father Campion invokes legal and extralegal powers as defense attorney ro save Matthew's life.The plotting is mastererly. Page Sidney Lumet as director of the novel as film!.