Omerta, the Sicilian code of silence, has been the cornerstone of the Mafia's sense of honour for centuries. Born in the Sicilian hills, omerta carried the Mafia through a hundred years of change, but now at the century's end it is becoming a relic from a bygone age. Honour may be silent - but money talks. New York - a mob boss is assassinated. His nephew Astorre Viola and the head of the city's FBI both launch investigations into the murder. But this time silence spreads like a contagion: the silence of rival gangs, the silence of crooked bankers, even the silence of the courts...