'See Naples and Die' - when the expression was coined two hundred years ago it was to describe the great beauty of the city. Today it could as well apply to the deadly power of the region's greatest menace.

The Camorra - Naples' equivalent to the Mafia - was born in the late 18th century, about a century earlier than its Sicilian counterpart. Over the years, the Camorra's power has ebbed and flowed but it has never been stronger nor more dangerous than it is today.

From small-time cigarette smugglers in the 1960s, the Camorra has become the dominant economic and political force in Naples and southern Italy - outstripping the Mafia in economic power and sucking every political party in the area into its wake. The emergence of new and more powerful branches of the Camorra has been a frequent feature of this particularly sinister face of organised crime.

Tom Behan's disturbing and in-depth account of their power and influence is destined to become the classic work on a dark network, whose ways have, until now, always been hidden.