In a typical good guy/bad guy situation, you hardly expect to find yourself rooting for the organized crime families of the world. In The Wolf by Lorenzo Carcaterra, it's organized crime vs. terrorists. Vincent Marelli, head of US operations and our "hero", is the leader of the organized crime council, a group of international crime bosses. When his wife and daughters are killed in an airplane hijacking, Marelli convenes a meeting of the council to declare war. While there is a personal stake in discovering the perpetrators behind his family's deaths, he is also convinced that the chaos of worldwide terrorism threatens the financial stability of the organized crime empire.
Back and forth go the bad guys and the really bad guys with hardly a single policeman or anti-terror official to be found. It is quite entertaining to see the vast amounts of information Marelli and his gang can dig up with their unlimited funds. There is certainly no red tape and the bureaucracy is of an entirely different nature. The Wolf is a quick and easy read, unique in that the author pits two criminal enterprises against each other. You don't have to care about law enforcement, governments, or regular people. Just embrace la famiglia.
-Elizabeth
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