Mafia Wife: My Story of Love, Murder, and Madness

I was fresh off of reading "Westies" and was wishing that they had given more detail about Sissy Featherstone and Edna Coonan and their lives and ordeals with there husbands when I found this at the local bookshop. I flipped though it, thought it intresting and picked it up. I think the thing you have to understand is that when dealing with 85% of people in the mafia or associated in some way with the mafia. They aren't well educated. Or else they wouldn't have had to start doing petty crimes to get somewhere. They would have went to Law School or taken more traditional paths. At the beginning of this book, I do see where alot of people call Lynda 'whinny', but she was telling why she turned out the way she did and why she put up with Louie even though he abused her. But as you go into the book, I feel it does get more intresting and I didn't want to put it down. And for not being as well educated as most expect, Lynda did really well for herself. It's a true story, and sometimes the people with the most intresting stories are the one's that didn't finish 8th grade. I think people need to remember that. 5 stars for Lynda not so much the book.

As a local boy, I know the places and the types of people of which Lynda speaks. My mother-in-law's house was in walking distance to both Lynda and Louie's house as well as Sammy Gravano's. I drive past Paul Castellano's "White House" all the time. I smirked and giggled, so much of this rings so true. It's the story of Lynda, an outsider on the inside (or is it an insider on the outside?), "The Life" and the fear that is part in parcel of being married to Louie Milito - a thief, loanshark and murderer. She recounts her childhood in Brooklyn, dropping out of high school, meeting Louie, her tumultuous marriage, her friends in and out of "The Life" and the bittersweet day that Louie failed to make it home. Lynda provides stunning insights into the dynamics of trying to live a normal family life as her husband rises in the ranks of the crime family. Her struggles to escape the insular world that Louie draws her into, the despair, the fleeting joys, as well as the violent end of many of their acquaintances, make for a very compelling story. As I read Mafia Wife, I wondered who would write the screen play and who would be cast as Lynda and Louie. It would make a great double feature with Goodfellas.

I found the book to be very interesting and I would recommend it to anyone looking for a true woman's perspective on the Mafia. I agreed with the book and the way it was written and found it to be very comprehensive and thought provoking. In my point of view I believe you get a true "connected" woman's view, but at the same time her (the author's) personal feelings about certain members of the Mafia. The only downside to the book that I noticed was that as mentioned in the beginning of the book that author states that most of the names used were changed to protect those involved. I understand that completely, but it seems whenever a new character is introduced you find yourself reminded of the name changes constantly. Personally, I found this to be a bit nerve racking. Overall I would suggest reading this book, it does give a well painted portrait of the people involved and is a very personal insider point of view. It was also a fairly easy book to read and contains very simple dialogue/text as if the author is in the same room talking to you. Over the few days it took me to read it I found myself having a hard time putting it down so I have rated it 5 stars.Ciao and enjoy.......

This is an excellent strong female story about love, murder, and the choices one has to make in life. Unfortunately for Louie and Lynda most of them were ones that lead to illness and death. This is a phenomenal read with imagery ad stories that leap out onto the page. I can't wait to see the movie!!!

Louie Milito was a member of the Gambino family, a "goodfella," a "made guy," "a friend of ours" who disappeared one night in 1988. He was murdered, it turned out, as part of a power play by family underboss Sammy "The Bull" Gravano, Milito's childhood friend. Milito left behind a fractured, badly damaged family who, to this day, continue to feel the effect of living in the wake of his violent, unpredictable life and his sudden, violent death. MAFIA WIFE is the brutally honest story of Milito's widow, Lynda. Her story reads like a hybrid of the movies Goodfellas and Witness to the Mob, as well as the television show The Sopranos. Indeed, Lynda herself indicates that Witness to the Mob was based, in part, on her life with Louie, and that there is a creative connection between that film and The Sopranos. There are certainly elements of her life in all three works: a nice Jewish girl meets an Italian bad boy who is connected. She marries for love, but it is love inexorably linked with a desire to escape a home life that is cold and unloving. The qualities that attract her to him --- his confidence, his attentiveness, his strength of personality, and yes, his brutality --- are ultimately the very things that repel her when she is the target of their extremes. Lynda is quite honest and forthright about the conflicting emotions she experienced, and lived with, while married to Louie Milito. While she was damaged emotionally well before she met Louie, his physical and emotional abuse, combined with his mood swings and chosen occupation, rendered her an emotional wreck. Yet she stayed with him, in part out of duty to her children and husband, in part due to the material wealth he accumulated secondary to his criminal enterprises. Lynda acknowledges in the Epilogue to MAFIA WIFE that she has continued to experience emotional problems --- she tacitly acknowledges that her penchant for becoming enmeshed in destructive relationships continues to this day --- but she continues to struggle to overcome her problems and, failing that, to deal with them. MAFIA WIFE is fascinating on a number of levels. It reads like a long, rambling conversation that frequently trails off onto tangents but that you would nonetheless stay up all night to listen to --- or, in this case, to read. This technique, which I believe is natural and unintentional, makes MAFIA WIFE all the more interesting to read. While this is an extremely interesting tale, it is anything but uplifting. The reality of these people, living outside of the law, is closer to Reservoir Dogs than to The Sopranos. The life that Louie Milito chose for himself, and for his family, will undoubtedly have repercussions for generations. This, ultimately, is the lesson to be learned from MAFIA WIFE. --- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub