This book is spot-on as a prequel to The Godafather. So many characters are coming back to life with each page...you can picture them vividly only younger.

Since its based on a screenplay that Mario Puzo had written, its no wonder the book seems to be a wonderful complement to the original. Not only does this book round out the original story (by filling in the pieces that the film The Godfather Part II did not), it also makes The Godfather's Return and Revenge seem even more awful because the writing in this book very Puzo.

Awhile back, I wrote that I thought Mark Winegardner's books had their moments but after having read The Family Corleone...I see even moreso that Mark Winegardner was merely writing his books out of thin air as opposed to rounding out the original characters as older people. He simply didn't involve the original storylines enough and brought in way too many characters that I didn't care about. He basically left Puzo's style out of those books.

Anyhow, it's good to have the Corleones back.

Hopefully, there is one more book left that could possibly flesh out the end of the Corleones and fix the damage of not only Winegardner's books but The Godfather Part III as well.

It would be great to see Michael's son grow up not only to take over the family busines but to be the last one in the family business. Whether he dies, goes to prison or becomes a rat wouldn't matter so long as the story finally had a good ending. They might even call the book: Centanni - 100 years of the Corleones.