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Easily the worst book Ive ever read. Mark Winegardner just shows how bad of a writer, and how he was the worst possible choice to write this book. There are many reasons for this.
1. Carlo Tramonti, now, if memory serves me correctly, Carlo TRamonti was just in the background in the commision meeting in the original book. Barely mentioned. In the 1st film, he was left ON THE CUTTING ROOM FLOOR. Now MArk Winegardner, being the BRILLAINT talent that he is, creates some pyscotic, delusional character of his own based on the 3 lines of dialogue from the original novel. The man who in the original book just sat there not saying much of anything in 1 scene, now comes up w/ some plot to kill the president... And speaking of which...
2. The Whole Shea Thing.
Not only was it a COMPLETE rip off of the Kennedy assasination, it just didnt fit at all w/ the GF. Its bullshit. The reason tramonti wants to kill the pres. is hilarious, a joke.
See, I could understand a bad temper, but a mafia boss does not kill the president of the united states.
3. Nick Geraci
Ugh. Nick Geraci. A character createdd by Winegardner, and apparently based off him too, which is ridiculous. Mark W. Makes Geraci into a badass, and makes the entire book about him, and tthe ending, timid, and VERY predictable, with Geraci getting himself killed. I hate how the book writes him as the best earner the corleones ever had. Then in GFR, another piece of crap, why does Micheal attempt to kill him. The explanation makes no sense.
4. Winegardner Seems to Hate all the characters Puzo created.
He portrays Micheal as a coward who " has problems in the sack", no I didnt make that up. He portrays Connie as a whore and unreliabble, which is slightly true ( at the time), but his hate for the character is evident. Dont get me started on what he did to poor Fredo.
He portrays Sonnys wife as an overweight shrew.
Johnny Fontane is shown as a shmuch and an overall loser, and he realy didnt need in the book.
He portrays Neri as an asshole and an overall idiot. I found myself not enjoying Micheals presence, but of course, for the whole goddamned book, he basicly roots for Geraci. You can easily tell he wants his sh*t character to win, but when its written like that and geraci dies at the end?! Unsatisfying, overall poorly done plotine. Winegardners characters that he created belong in a completely different book. He should of wrote Geraci in some other crap of his own and let him win.
The ending of the book makes you feel unsatisfied, and cheated out of your money. We can all take comfort in the fact that this isnt even canon. I hope not...
Whew, Ive been holding that in for a long time now.
Well, theres are the main things that angered me about the book.
I think its a damn shame they didnt get somebody good to write the book, well at least we have " The Sicillian"
.