The Godfather

Obviously I love all the movies, but I've never read any of the books. Anyone think they're worth reading?

 

I believe there's only the one book.

 

Only one book by Puzo. There's a Godfather Returns book banging around out there, but it isn't the same.

And yes, the book is worth reading. Lots of background stuff.

 

Lotsa stuff on the Johnny Fontane character that wasn't in the movie. Also a lot on Vito's rise to the top.

 

Saw the movie at least 50 times, probably more, when I bought the book to read on a trip home from Vegas. Couldn't put it down. Finished it on the plane. Outfreakingstanding. And I'm not one to read fiction. Like it's been said, lots of background stuff not in the movie, especially with Johnny.

 

No one will ever nominate Puzo for the Nobel Prize. His prose falls in the "nails on the blackboard" Tom Clancy school . It was a big bestseller when it was first published and the perfect beach read.

One of the few examples where the movie is way better than the book.

 

Loved the Godfather book, one of my all-time faves. My brother gave me The Godfather Returns to read ages ago but I haven't got around to it.

 

The Puzo estate awarded the rights to a Florida State english professor who wrote "The Godfather Returns" and, most recently, "The Godfather's Revenge". Both books tried to fill in any gaps from the end of Part II and the start of Part III, like what happened to the Tom Hagen character, etc. I forced myself to finish the most recent book, but it wasn't very good.

 

Reading the Godfather underscores what a great job Coppola did in getting to the heart of the story. It may not be great writing, but it's a great read.

 

Coppola took a trashy piece of fiction and transformed it into a work of art.

 

I bought a first edition copy of The Godfather about 10 years ago and thoroughly enjoyed reading it. As previously stated, there is a lot of background info on some of the characters (including Luca Braze, who is a background player in the first hour of Godfather 1 but is truly a bad ass in the book).

It is great reading.

 

Puzo wrote the book because his more serious efforts failed and he was heavily in debt to bookies.

I think that the book is pure pulp and FFC did more justice than it deserved. Smartly, he cut out the Johnny F. stuff, as well as the pages devoted Lucy Mancini and her oversized vagina.

What is intersting in that FFC included in passing a number of the scenes and people referenced in the book.

The two recent books filling in the blanks in time were just terrible.