( 34 reviews )
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Posted: Aug 14 2009
They just don't make crooks like they used to. The fascination people have with outlaws is neither a recent nor purely American experience. Before even legendary figures like Robin Hood, there were mythologies filled with trickster gods, the ultimate outlaws. In American history, there were two great outlaw eras: the late 19th Century period of Billy the Kid, Jesse James and Butch Cassidy, and the 1930s period of John Dillinger, Baby Face Nelson, Pretty Boy Floyd, Bonnie and Clyde, Machine Gun Kelly and the Barkers. Bryan Burrough's Public Enemies deals with these later outlaws, who pretty much all committed their crimes at the same time, from 1933 to 1934. In the depths of the Great Depression, these criminals targeted the institutions that were considered the greater evil by many, principally the banks. As Burrough indicates, however, most of these people would become legends only after their deaths; the one exception was John Dillinger, who seems to be the main character in this history (and is clearly the main character in the movie adaptation of the book starring Johnny Depp). Dillinger would captivate news readers during his string of crimes, using a charm that would endear him to as many people as he repulsed. Beyond the histories of these criminals, Public Enemies is also about the rise of the FBI. Prior to this period, the FBI was a rather messed-up agency, with little power or competence. J. Edgar Hoover, however, would use the threat of Dillinger, et al, to improve the Bureau and raise its respectability (though the James Cagney movie G-Men helped as much as Hoover's war on crime). The FBI would have its dark side too, often resorting to shady means to accomplish its ends. Burrough gives the reader the facts behind the legends, showing that most of the characters involved were not as one-dimensional as often portrayed. His writing style is at first a bit jarring: by telling things in an almost strictly chronological fashion, he often jumps from story to story. Eventually, he seems to ease off a bit (or maybe I just got used to his story-telling fashion). Public Enemies is a pretty good book and will give clarity to an era that is often obscured by myth.
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Posted: Aug 13 2009
I am a retired Detective (Oregon State Police) & this writing describes not only Dillinger, but the major criminals of 1933-34. It explains the birth & trying beginnings of the FBI as a national police agency. Anyone with a penchant for history of law enforcement & the opposing felons will enjoy this book immensely.
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Posted: Aug 12 2009
After watching the dull Johnny Depp movie, "Public Enemies," I had to pick up the book that the film was supposedly based on. The book couldn't possibly be as lame as the movie! And I was right. "Public Enemies" (the book), is rich in detail, broad in scope and packed with new ways of looking at old stories. The book covers the criminal careers of the great bank robbers of the early 1930s -- Pretty Boy Floyd, John Dillinger, Machine Gun Kelly, the Barker Gang and the infamous Bonny and Clyde. The War on Crime is the subject of page after detail-drenched page. The gangs' exploits, when they don't misfire, overlap with each other. Local law enforcement is either thoroughly corrupt or is almost comically unable to capture their quarry. J. Edgar Hoover's FBI, filled with college boys and focused on minutia like keeping crumbs off their desks, misses chance after chance to nail the bad guys. Much of the action seems to take place simultaneously, and Burrough provides time frames to keep the reader on track Though "Public Enemies" could use a few more pictures, its exquisitely-researched narrative is graphic enough. The book details jail breaks, close calls, national manhunts, tabloid newspapers, kidnappings, crime molls and vicious shootings. But Burrough is very keen not to romanticize the violent men who alternatively terrorized and fascinated large swaths of the country. Neither does he buy into the elf-serving myths that the FBI has served up over the years to tart up its sometimes accidental successes and play down its failures. A terrific slice of history that is fun to read and informative. The movie could have leaned on it much more.
