New book explores Mafia kinship ties
Friend and colleague Justin Cascio has penned a book-length discussion of transatlantic family connections of Corleone, Sicily, mafiosi. In Our Blood: The Mafia Families of Corleone , now available through Amazon in hardcover, paperback and ebook editions, is Cascio's first book. The Mafia criminal society is traditionally viewed as a hierarchical organization, but Cascio argues that Mafia networks are largely based on kinship ties. He has poured years of his research into this project. The publisher of the Mafia Genealogy website and a frequent contributor to Informer journal, Cascio is highly regarded as an underworld historian and genealogist. He notes that pivotal figures in Mafia history, including present-day mafiosi, have direct ties to one another and to the earliest recorded gangs in Corleone, Sicily. In addition to bloodline and marriage connections, some mafiosi also linked through the significant religious/family role of godparent. Cascio discusses dozens of gan