The Ice Man: Confessions of a Mafia Contract Killer Review

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The Ice Man: Confessions of a Mafia Contract Killer ReviewI've studied NYC, NJ & Philly OC for over 20 years now. I've read 100's of books on this subject including the one by Anthony Bruno about Kuklinski about 10 years ago. Some by cops, some by feds, some by rats, some by reporters. Nowhere have I ever read, even hinted at, the more outragous claims made by Richard (Iceman) Kuklinski. A couple of the more unbelievable.
Paul (Big Paul) Castellano Shooting. HE WAS NOT THERE. This was planned and executed by "The Fist" a faction of Gambino's dissatisfied for a number of reasons with his leadership. The Fist was made up of John Gotti, Angelo Ruggerio, Frankie DeCicco, Robert (DeBee) Debenardo, and Sammy Bull Gravano. Others in the family (Gene Gotti, Joe Gallo, et al) knew of the plot, but it emulated and was executed primarily by the Bergin crew headed by Gotti. Below are the shooters. NONE was paid cash to participate. The payment was power within the Gambino's hierarchy after Big Paul was dead. There is NO WAY Gravano would have asked or Gotti would have approved of an unknown shooter being brought into the plot as a freelance mercenary.
John CarnegliaPrimary shooter, target Castellano, in front of Sparks,
Vincent Artuso Primary shooter, target Castellano, in front of Sparks,
Eddie LinoPrimary shooter, target Billotti, in front of Sparks,
Salvatore (Fat Sally) Scala,Primary shooter, target Billotti, in front of Sparks,
Dominick (Skinny Dom) Pizzonia,Back-up shooter across E. 46th St. from Sparks,
Anthony (Tony Roach) Rampino,Back-up shooter across E. 46th St. from Sparks,
Angelo (Quack Quack) Ruggerio,Back-up shooter across E. 46th St. from Sparks,
Joe (The German)Watts,Back-up shooter across E. 46th St. from Sparks,
John GottiIn Car at 3rd Ave & E. 46th St. opposite Sparks,
Salvatore (Sammy Bull) GravanoIn Car at 3rd Ave & E. 46th St. opposite Sparks,
FrankDeCiccoInside Sparks
The association with and killing of Roy DeMeo. It is possible that Kuklinski knew DeMeo. Although no cooperating witnesses ever mentioned him. It is even possible that DeMeo kept "The Pollock" around as a secert weapon - that I'd believe. But there is NO WAY, NONE, ZERO that DeMeo would have introduced him to his supervisor in the Gambino family, Anthony Gaggi. And Gaggi wouldn't introduce himself. BTW Gaggi's dog was not a German shepard but a pure breed male boxer. Lastly, Roy was killed by fellow crew associates Joseph Testa and Anthony Senter as well as Nino after orders came from Paul to "take care of him Nino". Also, Frankie DeCicco was instructed to assist Nino if he needed shooters or back-up. Again, no one was paid. Senter and Testa were promoted to made status. Dracula was killed around the same time.
The killing of Jimmy Hoffa. C'mon not even the author could possibly believe this. It has been verified beyond dispute that Tony Pro was in NJ at the time of the killing. I'm not going to waste time reputing this BS any more.
Carmine (Lilo, Cigar) Galante Shooting. There was a lone dinner in Joe & Mary's that hot July afternoon according to Giuseppe Turano's son. However, he hit the deck when Louis Giongetti, Dominick Trinchera and Sonny Black walked in armed to teeth. Turncoat Galante bodyguard Cesare Bonventre pulled his pistol and shot loyal Galante bodyguard Leonard Coppola six times before he hit the floor. Clueless and 3rd bodyguard Baldassare (Baldo) Amato pulled his gun and dove behind a table. Sonny shotgunned Galante while Big Trin chased down Turano's son and shot him in back while he searched for a gun stored in the employee's bathroom. Anthony "Bruno" Indelicato waited in the street by the car with a M1 carbine. Louis Giongetti walked over to Coppola and shot the top of his skull of for good measure. Cesare quickly informed his cousin Baldo not to shoot and leave with him, which he did. This killing was ordered by boss Phillip Rastelli in conjuction with the Gambino's over control of the heroin market and revenge for Gambino killings. Ironically, it was the Zips headed by Salvatore Catalano & Joe Ganci who eventually took over Galante's babina business. Massino took control of the family. This account has been verified by several different sources.
Cave with Rats. Logistics would be unlikely or impossible. Try to find a remote cave 75 miles from home at night whilst guarding a live hostage. Try setting up automatic camera's w/ lights to capture the rats eating the victim. I will admit it's a sick mind to envision such things, but I doubt he actually did it. Camera, light and motion technology plus logistics of transport makes it an unlikely tale to scare women and small children.
Flare to balls.I read almost same account about Legs Diamond and a farmer in a book called Mob Stories about seven years ago. A little less graphic but, punch line was same. Probably Rich read this too. Obviously author didn't read it or don't know how to vet a source.
All in all a good book and worth the money for true crime buffs. I'm glad I bought it, but the killings Kuklinski actually did would have been enough. The other mob stuff is his own fantasy.
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Going Broke: Why Americans Can't Hold On To Their Money Review

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Going Broke: Why Americans Can't Hold On To Their Money ReviewThere are many things this book does well. (In fact, everything this book does, it does well.) First, and most remarkably, it tells stories. Not only is the author brave enough to reveal his own financial foibles, he includes interviews with individuals who have suffered financial ruin and lived to tell the tale. The stories are striking in their variety and poignancy, and they are made all the more salient by Vyse's beautifully written prose. The author paints a clear picture of his subjects' various crises, so that each story--no matter how different it may be from our own--has a sense of familiarity. We understand that these are fellow Americans who for the most part have worked hard and played by the rules, and we can't help recognizing their humanity and vulnerability as our own.
Moving beyond the stories that open each chapter, Vyse looks not only at the internal, "psychological" processes associated with financial difficulty--such as the seemingly inexplicable tendency to overpay for items on eBay--but he also uses a broad lens to examine the social and political forces that conspire against our best efforts to stay ahead in the financial game. Rather than simply attributing the bankruptcy epidemic to "shopaholism" or endemic self-indulgence (as many others blithely do), Vyse weaves together hard science, cultural criticism, and macroeconomic analysis to create a disturbing image of our personal--and national--economic landscape.
Finally, the majority of Vyse's suggestions for not going broke are practical, common-sense solutions that almost every American can employ. But even in presenting his suggestions, Vyse acknowledges that there are larger forces which need to be addressed before a majority of Americans can enjoy financial security. Far from being a panacea, Vyse presents his suggestions as something of a self-defense strategy in a world where our senses and sensibilities are constantly bombarded, and our financial futures are bought and sold by corporations without hesitation or regulation.
I recommend this book to anyone who is interested in human behavior, American culture, economics, politics, or public policy--and to anyone who just wants a good, thought-provoking read.
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Sickened: The Memoir of a Munchausen by Proxy Childhood Review

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Sickened: The Memoir of a Munchausen by Proxy Childhood ReviewThe first time I had heard of Munchausen by Proxy was in my Abnormal Psychology class. I couldn't believe that something like this actually existed. How could someone do this to their child? It is when a caretaker (often a mother) will keep his/her child sick or try to prove to others that the child is sick to gain attention for themselves. Unfortunately many cases go unnoticed because of how easy it is to hide. "A recent study indicates that when a case of MBP is finally recognized, up to 25% of the sickened child's siblings have already died---most likely earlier victims of the perpetrator."
Julie has always been a sickly child, for as long as she could remember. Her mother and grandmother often ran her to the hospital for food poisoning. There were very strange things that would go on in her family. Her grandmother would take her on fishing trips at the age of 3 or 4. She would tell her to hold on to something in the car, and get in a minor car accident. She would do this often, and it would always end the same. The grandmother would "disappear" and Julie would wander off, while crowds gathered, and someone would take her home to her mother. Her grandmother would come back, looking around for her lost granddaughter.
Her father had strange habits as well. He was a war veteran, who would spend days in front of the television, watching endless hours of M.A.S.H., and would yell at anyone who walked in front of the TV. He would only talk to you during commercials.
Her mother took her to endless doctors, only rushing her away to another one when they couldn't find anything wrong with her. When that didn't work, she kept her from eating and didn't give her lunch money. Julie was weak and malnourished. She got migraines quite often. When she did, Sandy (her mother) gave her a white pill to put under her tongue. Somehow, the migraines only got worse. When Julie stayed in the hospital so the doctors could take a closer look at what was happening with her heart, the sickness disappeared like magic. Doctors were baffled and her mother surprisingly wasn't happy about the good news.
I felt tremendous sympathy and compassion for this little girl and wondered why she didn't leave earlier. When she finally did leave (they weren't keeping her under lock and key) it surprised me that she came back. She had been humiliated, put down, beaten, forced to eat tissue, and many other things. I have never been the victim of abuse, so I don't know the feelings of attachment and dependence that she connected to her abusers. There were times that I almost put the book down because I had a hard time digesting the fact that this actually happens to children.
It was difficult to read, especially at the parts where no one believed Julie, and some people turned against her because they thought that she was telling lies about her mother. Sandy was an exquisite actress. She played the role of the perfect mother to a tee, horrified that something could happen to her baby, and that maybe Julie only had a little while to live. The fact that she got out without getting killed was astonishing.
I would have liked to see an epilogue, and whether or not she confronted her mother. I would also like to know her mothers thoughts and the allegations against her. I would also like to know the details of such things like the "white pills" that were used to take away her migraines and what her mother was doing to her to make her sick.
This should be recommended reading so people will be aware of this not commonly known, life-threatening illness.Sickened: The Memoir of a Munchausen by Proxy Childhood Overview

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A Teaching Seminar With Milton H. Erickson Review

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A Teaching Seminar With Milton H. Erickson ReviewThis book is a direct transcript of a week long hypnosis/psychotherapy seminar performed by Milton Erickson at the end of his life, and at the height of his expertise. It reads with the hypnotic fluidity of a good novel while teaching a tremendous amount- about many things. Erickson weaves his way through various teaching tales while interacting with people in the seminar. The reader is pulled down into one story, only to emerge back into the world of a previous story from a few pages back. While adrift between worlds, the reader learns an awful lot about psychotherapy, hypnosis, human behavior, farm life, developmental processes- to name a few.
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The Good Psychologist: A Novel Review

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The Good Psychologist: A Novel ReviewTHE GOOD PSYCHOLOGIST is the debut novel from Noam Shpancer and shows no signs of being a first novel. This book is written with intelligence, insight, passion and a great sense of humanity. The book is being described as a suspense novel and this can be very misleading. It is in no way a thriller or mere suspense novel. If someone picks it up to read expecting this they will be in for a shock. I certainly hope the word gets spread what this novel really is for it will then attract a whole difference audience who will appreciate this fine work.
This novel is a deep character study. The entire novel is told through the perspective of the main character who is known as only the unnamed psychologist. He lives his life with his practice as well as teaching a night class. As we get to know the good doctor his exlover, also his best friend, announces she is moving. He gets a new and intriguing patient who is a stripper. And one of his students proves to be a troubled case. The story is told through lectures, therapy sessions and pure thoughts as we are in the mind of the psychologist throughout. The drama and mystery that may exist is what one would get by being fully in the thought process of any person. Our psychologist is intelligent, caring and fully human. He reflects on his own imperfections and most importantly tries to be the best he can be while living life. This is a very human novel and was a very daring attempt by the author. For any author such a premise would be either a hit or miss. And here it is a true hit. The way the story brings therapy sessions, lectures and thoughts together merely brings us that much closer into the mind of the psychologist.
The book is in no way meant to be a high praise of the profession or a dig at it either. Our psychologist takes his job seriously and tries sincerely to help others. But the most important part of him is his humanity. What the novel shows is that all people are very complex and that there is much more to each of us deep inside. The journey we go on with the psychologist will have the reader very reflective on their own passions, desires actions and pursuits of life. Getting to know this character is time well spent and this novel is a hugely succesful debut from Noam Shpancer. This is a very intelligent piece of literature that I highly recommend.The Good Psychologist: A Novel Overview

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The Unwritten Rules of Social Relationships: Decoding Social Mysteries Through the Unique Perspectives of Autism Review

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The Unwritten Rules of Social Relationships: Decoding Social Mysteries Through the Unique Perspectives of Autism ReviewI love this book and would strongly recommend it to anyone interested in autism and/or sociology. I mention sociology because, even if you have no interest in autism, the book is a great look at all of the unwritten rules and codes in our society that we live by but may be unaware of. Also, we are reintroduced to Sean Barron, thirteen years after we first met him in "There's a Boy in Here".
I really feel that anyone who is working on social skills with someone on the autistic spectrum should read this book. I have looked at plenty of other books on teaching social skills, but there are some things that the books written by non-autistic authors just don't cover. Temple and Sean give frequent accounts of their reactions in social situations during various points in their lives, followed by explanations of why they reacted this way and what their rationale was at the time. There is a ton of really useful information here!
One point perhaps worth mentioning is that the focus of this book is very much on teaching those on the autistic spectrum about the rules and expectations of our society, so know that going in. This is a point that people may feel differently about - while some people advocate teaching these things to varying degrees, there are those who (in my understanding, at least) advocate for autism culture and believe in less 'adjustment' on the part of people with autism and instead more acceptance of the autistic way of doing things. Either way, I think there should be something in this book for many different types of readers, be it a background in teaching social skills, a look at sociology, two interesting partial auto-biographies, etc.The Unwritten Rules of Social Relationships: Decoding Social Mysteries Through the Unique Perspectives of Autism Overview

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Getting It Through My Thick Skull: Why I Stayed, What I Learned, and What Millions of People Involved with Sociopaths Need to Know Review

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Getting It Through My Thick Skull: Why I Stayed, What I Learned, and What Millions of People Involved with Sociopaths Need to Know ReviewI was pleasantly surprised by how much I liked his book. It's not a schlocky National Enquireristic piece of junk, it's a thoughtful and inspiring book that I had a hard time putting down.
Here's what was compelling to me... We all look at sensational media coverage of events by looking over the shoulders of reporters and papparazzi. In this book I really got a feel for what's it's like to be the person who's got the camera lens focused on their every move and breath. Mary Jo helped me to feel the violation of that in a very real way. I cannot imagine what it would be like to suffer the trauma of a senseless attack, only to be attacked over and over again by a senseless media circus.
Here's somebody who survived SO many things and it's inspiring to know that she's found a way to be a happy, healthy, and whole person. She's still walking around with a bullet in her head, but seems to have an attitude of optimism and dignity that I don't think I would be able to muster under similar life circumstances. It puts my seemingly "big" problems into perspective.
The most valuable part of this book to the world, I think, is the reference to sociopathic behavior. There is probably a HUGE number of women (and men!) living with sociopaths, completely unaware that the insanity of it isn't NORMAL. It's easy to get lost in that dysfunction, because of the ability of sociopaths to charm their way out of anything. I think it is the same kind of abuse as a spouse beater, without the physical wounds, but much more damaging because it messes with your head so bad.
Bravo to Mary Jo for all that she's lived through and all that she's shared - willingly or unwillingly - on the public stage.Getting It Through My Thick Skull: Why I Stayed, What I Learned, and What Millions of People Involved with Sociopaths Need to Know Overview

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