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All Carlo Bonini's books

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Latest reviews

THOUGH — OR PERHAPS BECAUSE — it has fallen on hard times, Rome remains one of the great antihero cities of Europe. Singular, even when in the company of iconic cities like Los Angeles, Berlin, London, and New York, because within its borders sits the Vatican — separate...
— Los Angeles Review of Books, Oct 10 2019

One of 2017's best new shows. Mob TV is hard to get right. But when it’s done right, oh boy, it is good. The Sopranos, which ran from 1999-2007, set the benchmark extremely high – with its complex characters, spell-binding performances and divisive ending. Boardwalk...
— NME, Oct 23 2017
Need a gangster fix? We've got you covered. In terms of memorable opening scenes, it's hard to top the image of a priest getting sweaty during a drug-fuelled orgy. Welcome to the world of Suburra, Netflix's new series that's more than capable of filling that Narcos-shaped hole...
— Joe, Oct 12 2017
(...) What you need is your new favourite Netflix series, Suburra. It’s a drama, set in contemporary Rome (see how cunningly I themed this week’s review), which people are calling the Italian answer to Narcos. Just as in real life, every stratum of society, from the church...
— The Spectator, Oct 12 2017
In ancient Rome, Suburra was a crowded, dirty place, notorious as a red-light district. This is where Julius Caesar was born and the big wigs from the worlds of politics, criminality and religion gathered in secret. Based on the novel of the same name and a prequel to the 2015...
— BBC.com, Oct 2 2017
Carlo Bonini and Giancarlo De Cataldo have written a blistering, grimly absorbing satire.
— New Statesman, Sep 24 2017
A splendid portrait of the corruption that took hold of the Roman region during the Berlusconi years as mafia, politicians and local hoods all dipped their fingers into the kitty…
— Crime Time, Sep 20 2017
Berlusconi Babylon might be an alternative title for Carlo Bonini and Giancarlo De Cataldo’s Suburra, translated by Antony Shugaar (Europa £13.99), which has already been turned into an Italian Netflix series. Set in Rome in 2011, the bunga-bunga premier’s last year in power,...
— The Times, Sep 17 2017
Caustic and blunt, Suburra is a reminder that crime fiction can say as much about a society as other genres.
— The Guardian, Sep 17 2017
Italy has become stiff competition for Mexico these days in matters of film, and TV series about organized crime. Books, of course, have been the catalyst for nearly all of these recent adaptations. First, in 2005 the powerful and award-winning film Romanzo Criminale, adapted...
— Bookwitty, Sep 11 2017
Enter, Suburra: The Series an Italian Netflix Original which is based on a book by Carlo Bonini and Giancarlo de Cataldo. The series is set over 20 days and the 10 episodes explore the power structures between state, church and crime, all of whom vie for power in Rome.
— Esquire, Sep 5 2017
If you like your crime fiction to be true to life, intelligent and serious in intent this is a great read. One not forgotten easily.
— Nudge-Book, Aug 26 2017
Suburra (Europa Editions, €18.45) is a sprawling tale of corruption on an epic scale, as politicians, judiciary, police, Mafia and the Vatican fight for a slice of the pie that is the Roman suburb of Suburra during the dog days of the Berlusconi administration. Co-written by...
— The Irish Times, Aug 12 2017
An adaptation of Europa Editions title Suburra by Carlo Bonini and Giancarlo De Cataldo is to be broadcast as a 10-part drama series for Netflix this autumn. Suburra, a "fast-paced" crime thriller set in Rome, will be published by Europa on 24th August. The title is a...
— The Bookseller, Aug 3 2017
Based on a real-life scandal, Suburra is set in the closing days of Burlusconi’s feckless reign, as a coterie of mafia outfits and corrupt politicians try to make Ostia, the ancient port of Rome, into a Macau-style gambling haven. The cosmology of Italy’s underworld is sordid,...
— Literary Hub, Aug 1 2017
n 1993, 18-year-old Marco Malatesta, the hero of this fast-moving crime thriller from journalist Bonini and novelist De Cataldo (The Father and the Foreigner), was a “hoodlum from Talenti with plenty of heart.” He followed a gang leader known as Samurai, who asserted that...
— Publisher’s Weekly, Aug 1 2017
In Ostia, a depressed coastal settlement twenty miles from the powerful and corrupt city of Rome, a mighty local crime family, the Mafia, corrupt politicians, and new rabid criminal elements battle each other for a billion-dollar payoff. During the final days of Silvio Berlusconi's...
— Shots Magazine, Apr 25 2017
The Italian 'The Wire' Suburra (Netflix) David Simon’s 2002-2008 series raised the aspirations of an entire medium. Coming before The Wire, illustrating the interconnected nature of society and all the institutions within it was assumed to be the work of novels...
— Evening Standard, Mar 17 2017
ROME — Netflix has announced that principal photography started in Rome this week on its first Italian original series, “Suburra,” about present-day ties between organized crime and politics in the Italian capital. The first Italian production from Netflix is being...
— Variety, Feb 13 2017

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