The Good Mothers: The True Story of the Women Who Took on The World's Most Powerful Mafia

The Good Mothers: The True Story of the Women Who Took on The World's Most Powerful Mafia
Alex Perry

You are born into it or marry in. Loyalty is absolute, bloodshed revered and you kill or go to your grave before betraying The Family. This code of omertà is how the 'Ndrangheta became the world’s most powerful mafia. The Good Mothers is the story of the women who broke the silence.We live in their buildings, work in their companies, shop in their stores, eat in their restaurants and elect politicians they fund. Founded more than 150 years ago by shepherding families in the toe of Italy, the ’Ndrangheta is today the world’s most powerful mafia, with a crushing presence in southern Italy, a market-moving size in global finance and a reach that extends to fifty countries around the world. And yet, remarkably, few of us have ever heard of it.The ’Ndrangheta’s power rests on a code of silence, omertà, enforced by a claustrophobic family hierarchy and murderous misogyny. Men and boys rule. Girls are married off as teenagers in arranged clan alliances. Beatings are routine. A woman who is ‘unfaithful’ – even to a dead husband – can expect her sons, brothers or father to kill her to erase the ‘family shame’.In 2009, when abused wife Lea Garofalo ‘disappears’ after giving evidence against her mafiosi husband, prosecutor Alessandra Cerreti realises the ’Ndrangheta’s bigotry may be its great flaw. The key to bringing down this criminal empire is to free its women and allow them to speak out and testify. When Alessandra finds two collaborators inside Italy’s biggest crime families, she must persuade them to cooperate, and save themselves and their children.The stakes could not be higher. Alessandra is fighting to save a nation. The mafiosi are fighting for their existence. The women are fighting for their lives. Not all will survive.

(#ue1fecbe0-9bc8-5299-9900-d520dc54e9c8)

Copyright (#ue1fecbe0-9bc8-5299-9900-d520dc54e9c8)

William Collins

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

WilliamCollinsBooks.com (http://www.williamcollinsbooks.com)

This eBook first published in Great Britain by William Collins in 2018

Copyright © Alex-Perry.com Ltd 2018

Cover image © Alamy

Cover design by Leo Nickolls

Maps by Martin Brown

Alex Perry asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008222109

Ebook Edition © February 2018 ISBN: 9780008222123

Version: 2018-02-01

Dedication (#ue1fecbe0-9bc8-5299-9900-d520dc54e9c8)

For the good daughters

and for Tess, always

Contents

Cover (#u55b4eb8a-8e33-5e33-9d75-3856c6c58da4)

Title Page (#u86453e18-7a60-5158-a356-e2298c94c0e4)

Copyright (#ub9ff6f5c-36ef-57ba-8f39-7904977c0a4a)

Dedication (#u4ac8fb93-62ae-5502-b539-cae25c74125b)

Maps (#u7af50623-763d-5d43-8e9b-bd49b7ad0945)

Author’s Note (#u95e73f74-6122-5c1a-a206-30babe83147d)

ACT ONE: A VANISHING IN MILAN (#u006414e4-50cb-53b8-8113-7c2103b85f6b)

I (#u53b33154-bc59-530b-a88a-79eeaf7ade24)

II (#u7b67d29b-0dcc-562d-823e-d8d97f761530)

III (#ufb2afe13-2c3b-5261-8d2e-2b072bc24751)

IV (#uac468ee4-8495-5d87-a51b-22024275df5c)

V (#u488c03c1-fd92-5472-b301-841f551024f4)

VI (#u889e8f20-c02d-5357-9a18-ad626a7deeff)

VII (#litres_trial_promo)

VIII (#litres_trial_promo)

ACT TWO: REBELLION IN ROSARNO (#litres_trial_promo)

IX (#litres_trial_promo)

X (#litres_trial_promo)

XI (#litres_trial_promo)

XII (#litres_trial_promo)

XIII (#litres_trial_promo)

XIV (#litres_trial_promo)

XV (#litres_trial_promo)

XVI (#litres_trial_promo)

XVII (#litres_trial_promo)

ACT THREE: ITALY AWAKES (#litres_trial_promo)