Pawns in the Game is a historical fiction novel set in the mid- to late-twentieth-century Philadelphia. It follows the life, from birth till death, of a boy named Donnie McCullough, an Irish American who immigrated from Ireland in the 1940s and ended up losing both of his parents in a very tragic manner.

After a family friend adopted him and his younger two siblings, their new stepfather turns out to be the head of one of the Sicilian crime families out of Eastern Philadelphia. Donnie grows up to admire his new father figure and goes to great lengths to please him and everyone under him, while also serving his country in Vietnam and eventually marrying and having a child before his life takes a sudden, egregious turn and things go south not only for him but for all the families in Philadelphia.