Get Capone: The Secret Plot That Captured America's Most Wanted Gangster

by Jonathan Eig

Book Overview

Drawing on thousands of pages of recently discovered government documents, wiretap transcripts, and Al Capone's handwritten personal letters, New York Times bestselling author Jonathan Eig tells the dramatic story of the rise and fall of the nation's most notorious criminal in rich new detail. From the moment he arrived in Chicago in 1920, Capone found himself in a world of limitless opportunity. He was an impetuous, affable young man of average intelligence,...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 141658059X
• ISBN13: 9781416580591
• Release Date: April 2010
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Length: 468 Pages
• Weight: 1.71 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.4" x 6.6" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

Amazon & Kindle v. B & N

The sample I read looks great. If you don't like the Kindle price try the B & N Nook price at more than twenty dollars. Thank God for Kindle and Amazaon!

The Ultimate Capone Biography

Author Jonathan Eig has written three books and all of them have been blockbusters. I have two biographies on Al Capone, and both of them are worthy additions to one's library. However, Eig's latest effort on the infamous Chicago gangster tops them all. I initially wondered what his biography could offer that wasn't in the previous two I have in my library, and I have been anxiously anticipating the release of this book. Mr. Eig's biography is not a rehash of the gangland killings that took place during the 1920s, although they obviously must play a part. In addition to interviewing several members of the Capone family author Eig had access to papers that previous Capone authors did not. I also enjoy the author's unique writing style in describing the various incidents throughout the book. An example would be the death of Hymie Weiss on North State Street next to the Holy Name Cathedral. We have heard several versions on what actually took place and who was involved in the 1929 St. Valentine's Day Massacre, and author Eig has his own theory based on a letter written in 1935. It is quite interesting and could very well answer several previously unanswered questions. Perhaps Capone wasn't involved at all. The main heroes of the book are the incorruptible U.S. Attorney George E. Q. Johnson and Frank Wilson of the U.S. Bureau of Internal Revenue who built the case against Al Capone. Being unable to obtain a conviction for the numerous murders attributable to Capone they achieved a conviction on a lesser charge, that on income tax evasion. This is now done routinely in courtrooms today. Unlike Capone's mentor, Johnny Torrio, Capone had a weakness of not maintaining a low profile. Does John Gotti come to mind? The city of Chicago acquired an image of a gangster on every corner blasting someone away with the gun that made the twenties roar. This was a reputation the city didn't want to project to tourists. We also get to know the personalities of several of the decade's role players quite well. Jack "Greasy Thumb" Guzik, Frank "The Enforcer" Nitti, Johnny Torrio, George "Bugs" Moran, and Crooked Mayor "Big Bill the Builder" Thompson to name a few. Use your imagination and you can see that, yes, Thompson DID resemble a pigeon. Cemetery connoisseurs may want to pay a visit to the Mount Carmel Cemetery located in the western Chicago suburb of Hillside where several of these gangsters, including Capone, are buried. As an aside to the author who may want to make a few minor corrections in the paperback edition of the book: Page 101 (near the bottom the word "with" is repeated), page 213 (near the bottom the word "known" should be "know"), and page 286 the last paragraph (the first sentence the first "was" should be omitted). Finally on the top of page 168 one of the murder twins Albert Anselmi, is incorrectly referred to as "Robert." In no way do these errors detract from the book. I simply put them here in case he may want to ma

A Riveting All-American Parable of Ambition, Violence, and Punishment

Get Capone is a truly riveting piece of work. It succeeds equally well as: a gin and morality-laced tale of an anti-hero's rise and fall; a nuanced social history of America roaring into modernity; and a page-turning detective thriller about crime-fighting on the cusp of the age of CSI. Not only does every page of the book advance an incredibly compelling narrative, but it is also full of snappy language - alternatively poetic, hysterical, and profound -- that makes this book a literally delight but never distracts from its central story. Here are just two of my favorite passages: "The Great War was over. Men were back home, maybe a little shell-shocked, maybe a little bored, certainly thirsty." "(Herbert Hoover's) father was a blacksmith, a pious man, with a hot dash of American ambition." Eig is extraordinarily careful to separate provable fact from the massive tumult of myth and conjecture that still surrounds Capone's life, but he is nevertheless able to masterfully portray Capone as a complex figure who is alternatively ruthless, pathetic, funny, managerially brilliant, and tone-death to the real-life consequences of both his media pronouncements and his chosen profession. Decades before Tony Soprano ended up on Dr. Jennifer Melfi's couch, Eig gives us a multi-faceted portrayal of Capone's ever-fascinating psyche.

Get Mr. Eig

First, let me admit I have an axe to grind. Big Jon was supposed to come to Kingston, Jamaica and cover a band of aging pirates and ne're-do-wells foraying into the horseracing biz. Instead, Big Jon elected to stay home with the wife and write GET CAPONE. I argued that the world did not need another epic on Big Al. Having grown up in Chicago, Al and the Union Stock Yards were our base mythology, how we were known wherever we went. "No, ma'am, I don't have a tommy gun. No, sir, I don't know if Mr. Ness and Mr. Nitti were lovers." But if Jon Eig has anything, it's a commitment to Fact; it's his brand. So if Jon tells us he has 10,000 Capone documents no one's ever seen before, he does. If he then tells us a massively different story of Al Capone, I believe him. I'm stunned, but I believe what I read Is that important in 2010? Oh, yeah. GET CAPONE isn't just Al, it's America pole-dancing on her criminal/success axis, be it in your congressman's DC office or Halliburton's boardroom. Crime works, baby--call it "derivatives trading" or the Northern Alliance. And Al Capone was American crime's first corporate Jesus. GET CAPONE should be a civics textbook, the "unvarnished truth" as we love to say while we varnish it. For the first time I can remember, GET CAPONE looks at what really happened and why, and why it's the religion that engulfs us today. GET CAPONE is one of the best non-fiction crime books I've ever read, crafted with the precision and backroom truth of KILLING PABLO and BLACKHAWK DOWN. Even if you don't care about the true pedigree of organized crime, buy this book so Jon will write another. America needs someone who deals in Facts to explain how a syphilitic Al Capone married Bernie Madoff and gave birth to a new ruling class who doesn't have to apologize for picking your pocket or killing your children. Charlie Newton CALUMET CITY

Brilliant: the best book on organized crime in years

This thoroughly-researched, richly explicative history of Al Capone and his times should be in the library of anyone who enjoys reading about 20th Century crime, and its roots; Al Capone, Prohibition, or Chicago-- it is authoritative on all counts. "Get Capone" is excellently written, and painstakingly produced, without a fault. The author knows his economic history, too: his contrast of Capone's Chicago with the excesses of Wall Street are succinct. "Get Capone" lays to rest the myth of Eliot Ness, whose role in convicting Al Capone has been greatly over-romanticized since the 1950s. Jonathan Eig rightly credits the quieter law enforcement figures who ended Capone's crime career. Eig is a scholar who recaptures Pres. Herbert Hoover's role in chasing Chicago's gangsters. If you enjoyed Bryan Burrough's "Public Enemies," you will love this book. For that matter, if you enjoyed "Luckiest Man" as much as my two sons and I did, "Get Capone" is another book for your permanent library. Jonathan Eig is a biographer on a par with Evan Thomas, Walter Isaacson, or Robert Caro.