The Great Depression of the 1930s irrevocably changed the lives of everyone who experienced it. Jobs were scarce. Money was tight. Survival for honest folk was a hard-scrabble test of endurance with the only guarantee being a whole lot of nothing at the end of the day, every day, every week, every month, year after year. As for getting ahead and making real money, that was a crazy dream straight out of Buck Rogers. It seemed those who lived the good life were either born rich, or became that way by working outside the law. This is the story of Rudy Kaplan, a young man growing up during a tough time in a tough Brooklyn neighborhood, and the price he and his family pay when, in order to get ahead, he decides to become...a Jew gangster.