''Shamrock Alley'' is a crime novel written by American novelist

Ronald Malfi Ronald Malfi (born April 28, 1977) is an American novelist whose genres include horror, thrillers, mainstream, and literary fiction. Malfi is also a musician, having fronted the Baltimore-based alternative rock band Nellie Blide as well as his ...

. It was originally published in 2009 by Medallion Press. The novel is based on a real-life investigation Malfi's father, a retired

Secret Service A secret service is a government agency, intelligence agency, or the activities of a government agency, concerned with the gathering of intelligence data. The tasks and powers of a secret service can vary greatly from one country to another. For i ...

agent, had worked back in the 1970s against

The Westies The Westies were a New York City-based Irish-American organized crime gang, responsible for racketeering, drug trafficking, and contract killing. They were partnered with the Italian-American Mafia and operated out of the Hell's Kitchen neighbo ...

. This is also the final novel where the author used his middle name on the cover and title page. The novel won a Silver

Independent Publisher Book Awards The Independent Publisher Book Awards, also styled as the IPPY Awards, are a set of annual literary awards for independently published books. They are the longest-running unaffiliated contest open exclusively to independent presses. The IPPY Aw ...

medal (IPPY) for Best Mystery/Suspense/Thriller.

Synopsis

Following an influx of

counterfeit money Counterfeit money is currency produced outside of the legal sanction of a state or government, usually in a deliberate attempt to imitate that currency and so as to deceive its recipient. Producing or using counterfeit money is a form of fraud ...

agent John Mavio goes undercover with an Irish gang known as the West Side Boys in Manhattan's

Hell's Kitchen Hell's Kitchen, also known as Clinton, or Midtown West on real estate listings, is a neighborhood on the West Side of Midtown Manhattan in New York City, New York. It is considered to be bordered by 34th Street (or 41st Street) to the south, ...

. Mavio's goal is to shut down the ring of

organized crime Organized crime is a category of transnational organized crime, transnational, national, or local group of centralized enterprises run to engage in illegal activity, most commonly for profit. While organized crime is generally thought of as a f ...

and flush out the source of the

, an operation that is perhaps the worst in history. The gang is led by two Irish thugs from Hell's Kitchen, Mickey O’Shay and Jimmy Kahn. These two violent criminals have been terrorizing the

Upper West Side The Upper West Side (UWS) is a neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It is bounded by Central Park on the east, the Hudson River on the west, West 59th Street to the south, and West 110th Street to the north. The Upper We ...

for years, and are involved in more than just a counterfeit operation—the local police have been investigating them for many years in connection with countless unsolved homicides. O'Shay and Kahn have inflicted gruesome deaths on numerous victims by bludgeoning, stabbing, shooting, and cutting into pieces the bodies of those who got in their way or refused to cooperate with their treacherous schemes. This brutality has even earned them some fear from the

Mafia "Mafia", as an informal or general term, is often used to describe criminal organizations that bear a strong similarity to the Sicilian Mafia, original Mafia in Sicily, to the Italian-American Mafia, or to other Organized crime in Italy, organiz ...

. Mavio's undercover role takes him deeper and deeper into the gruesome world of O'Shay, Kahn, and the rest of the West Side Boys. His life undercover is brutal and dangerous, and not only detrimental to his own well-being, but puts at risk the lives of Katie, his pregnant wife, and his dying father.

Reception

The book received generally favorable reviews. BookReview.com called it "an interesting police procedural" while one ''Booklist'' reviewer stated, "This is a gripping thriller, similar to the novels of

Gerald Petievich Gerald Petievich (b. 1944) is an American author of crime fiction, and a former agent of the United States Secret Service. Biography Petievich was born in Los Angeles County, California, to a family of Serbian descent. His father and brother w ...

, the

agent turned author ('' To Live and Die in L.A.'' is his most well-known title), but with more emotional and moral depth. The author's previous books have garnered him acclaim and a small but devoted audience; this one could easily lift him into the mainstream." Author

Lorenzo Carcaterra Lorenzo Carcaterra (born October 16, 1954) is an American writer of Italian descent. Hell’s Kitchen is the setting for his most famous book, ''Sleepers'', which was adapted as a 1996 film of the same name. In April 2009, he joined '' True/Sla ...

called the novel "a bottom-of-the-ninth, two-out, grand slam home run of a book."Publisher's website
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References

{{Reflist 2009 American novels American crime novels Novels about the Irish Mob Novels set in Manhattan Novels about organized crime in the United States American thriller novels