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Creole Trombone: Kid Ory and the Early Years of Jazz (American Made Music Series)
by John McCuskerEdward "Kid" Ory (1886-1973) was a trombonist, composer, recording artist, and early New Orleans jazz band leader. Creole Trombone tells his story from birth on a rural sugar cane plantation in a French-speaking, ethnically mixed family, to his emergence in New Orleans as the city's hottest band leader. The Ory band featured such future jazz stars as Louis Armstrong and King Oliver, and was widely considered New Orleans's top "hot" band. Ory's career took him from New Orleans to California, where he and his band created the first African American New Orleans jazz recordings ever made. In 1925 he moved to Chicago where he made records with Oliver, Armstrong, and Jelly Roll Morton that captured the spirit of the jazz age. His most famous composition from that period, "Muskrat Ramble," is a jazz standard. Retired from music during the Depression, he returned in the 1940s and enjoyed a reignited career.Drawing on oral history and Ory's unpublished autobiography, Creole Trombone is a story that is told in large measure by Ory himself. The author reveals Ory's personality to the reader and shares remarkable stories of incredible innovations of the jazz pioneer. The book also features unpublished Ory compositions, photographs, and a selected discography of his most significant recordings.
Crescendo: The Story of a Musical Genius Who Forever Changed a Southern Town
by Julie Cantrell Allen CheneyA hidden story of human triumph, Crescendo takes you on the rare journey of a musical prodigy who changed an entire community forever.More than eighty years ago, a musical prodigy with a brilliant mind was born into a poor, uneducated, and abusive family in rural South Georgia. At three years of age, Fred Allen could play Mozart sonatas on the piano without missing a note. But in spite of his obvious talent, Fred&’s parents discouraged him from expressing his creativity and intelligence, even going so far as locking him away from the old piano in their home. Forced to fend for himself through his adolescent years, Fred knew that if he was ever to make something of himself, he would need to find a way to rise above his broken background. With incredible effort, and a few miracles along the way, Fred managed to do just that, eventually earning acceptance into The Julliard School in New York City. While simultaneously attending Juilliard, Union Theological Seminary, and Columbia University, he also began directing a local church choir, where he caught the attention of the music industry.During the musical revolution of the 1960s, Fred earned numerous Grammy nominations and built a growing reputation within the industry. But just as his new career was beginning to take off, Fred was faced with an impossible decision. His wife announced that she no longer wanted to raise their daughter in New York City and was heading home to the South. Fred had come so far from the pain and brokenness of his past, he couldn&’t imagine giving up everything just to return to his childhood home.Trying not to think about what could have been, Fred took a job as a high school music teacher in his hometown of Thomasville, Georgia, a community of only 30,000 people. Far from the executive suites of RCA and the allure of Broadway, Fred never could have imagined that his new role would not only transform his life but also change an entire community forever.
Crete
by Barry Unsworth"His keen understanding of history and legend. . . illuminate[s] his visits. " -Publishers Weekly "A vivid picture of the island. " -Associated Press "It is hard to think of anywhere on earth where so many firsts and mosts are crammed into a space so small," Barry Unsworth writes of the isle of Crete. Birthplace of the Greek god Zeus, the Greek alphabet, and the first Greek laws, as well as the home of 15 mountain ranges and the longest gorge in Europe, this land is indisputably unique. And since ancient times, its inhabitants have maintained an astonishing tenacity and sense of national identity, even as they suffered conquest and occupation by Romans, Byzantines, Arabs, Venetians, Ottoman Turks, and Germans. Throughout this evocative book, now in trade paper, Unsworth describes the incredible physical and cultural proportions of the island-in history, myth, and reality. Moving and artful,Cretegives readers a comprehensive picture and rich understanding of this complex-and indeed, almost magical-world of Mediterranean wonders. With the same keen eye and clear, eloquent prose that distinguishes his acclaimed historical novels, Barry Unsworth delivers his readers a two-fold traveler's reward, at once a wonderfully detailed panorama of Crete's many layers of history and an evocative portrait of an island almost literally larger than life. From the Trade Paperback edition.
Criando hijos, creando personas
by Alejandra Libenson¿Cómo lograr que nuestros hijos coman bien? ¿Cuándo es el momento de sacarles los pañales? ¿A dormir se aprende? ¿Cuándo y cómo destetar al bebé? ¿Cuál es la mejor manera de estimular? ¿Qué significa "poner límites"? ¿Qué jardín de infantes elegir y cómo lograr una buena adaptación? ¿Los celos son "normales"? ¿Cómo manejar los miedos de los niños y los nuestros? ¿Cómo los preparamos para los cambios? ¿Cómo superar la culpa por volver a trabajar? Durante tres años, Alejandra Libenson respondió, a través de la web, a estas y a muchas otras inquietudes que le transmitían padres de diversos lugares del mundo. Sobre esta base, de preguntas y respuestas reales, comenzó a gestarse este libro con el objetivo de que esta rica experiencia sirviera a muchos otros padres. Ningún niño es igual a otro; ningún padre reacciona de idéntica manera ante sus hijos. En consecuencia, no existen "recetas" mágicas para criarlos, sino caminos posibles, que se van descubriendo en la prolongada, ardua y maravillosa tarea de ser padres. Respondiendo el interrogante individual, personal y propio de cada mamá, papá o adulto a cargo de niños, la autora nos va abriendo la puerta a diferentes formas de pensar la crianza de nuestros hijos, nos acerca soluciones insospechadas y nos ayuda a encontrar nuevos enfoques. Un libro diferente que parte de la convicción de que criar niños no es un adiestramiento ni un camino que se transita siguiendo recetas. Es crear personas, es creer en ellos y crecer con ellos.
Crianças Divertidas: Histórias Verdadeiras de Experiências Infantis Engraçadas
by Leroy VincentCrianças Divertidas é um livro cheio de histórias verídicas de pessoas reais sobre as experiências engraçadas e embaraçosas das crianças. Este livro é fantástico para quem quer rir. Vai-se rir e pode até mesmo dizer, "Isso aconteceu comigo."
Cricket's Greatest Rivalry: A History of The Ashes in 12 Matches
by Simon HughesCompletely revised and updated featuring two brand new chapters, in preparation for the 2019 Ashes seriesFrom the William Hill Award-Winning Author of A Lot of Hard Yakka comes Cricket's Greatest Rivalry: A History of the Ashes in 12 Matches by Simon Hughes.A fast-paced, distinctive history of the iconic, 137-year-old cricketing rivalry between England and Australia published in the year of back-to-back Ashes contests.No other sport has a fixture like the Ashes. From the early 1880s the rivalry between these two great sporting nations has captured the public imagination and made sporting legends of its stars. Commentator, analyst and award-winning cricket historian Simon Hughes tells the story of the 12 seminal series that have become the stuff of sporting folklore. Cricket's Greatest Rivalry places you right at the heart of the action of each pivotal match, explaining the social context of the time, the atmosphere of the crowd and the background and temperaments of the players that battled in both baggy green and blue caps.The book also includes complete statistics and records of all the Ashes fixtures and results and much more!
Cricket's Greatest Rivalry: Completely revised and updated for 2019
by Simon HughesCompletely revised and updated featuring two brand new chapters, in preparation for the 2019 Ashes seriesFrom the William Hill Award-Winning Author of A Lot of Hard Yakka comes Cricket's Greatest Rivalry: A History of the Ashes in 12 Matches by Simon Hughes.A fast-paced, distinctive history of the iconic, 137-year-old cricketing rivalry between England and Australia published in the year of back-to-back Ashes contests.No other sport has a fixture like the Ashes. From the early 1880s the rivalry between these two great sporting nations has captured the public imagination and made sporting legends of its stars. Commentator, analyst and award-winning cricket historian Simon Hughes tells the story of the 12 seminal series that have become the stuff of sporting folklore. Cricket's Greatest Rivalry places you right at the heart of the action of each pivotal match, explaining the social context of the time, the atmosphere of the crowd and the background and temperaments of the players that battled in both baggy green and blue caps.The book also includes complete statistics and records of all the Ashes fixtures and results and much more!(p) 2019 Octopus Publishing Group
Cricket: Every reason to celebrate
by Scyld BerryWinner of the Cricket Writers' Club Book of the Year 2016Shortlisted for the MCC Book of the YearShortlisted for Cricket Book of the Year at the Sports Book AwardsScyld Berry draws on his experiences as a cricket writer of forty years to produce new insights and unfamiliar historical angles on the game, along with moving reflections on episodes from his own life. The author covers a range of themes including cricket in different areas of the world, and abstract concepts such as language, numbers, ethics and psychology; Scyld Berry relishes the joys cricket provides and is convinced of the positive effect it can have in people's lives. Cricket: The Game of Life is an inspiring book that reminds readers why they love the game and prompts them to look at it in a new way.
Cricket: Every reason to celebrate
by Scyld BerryWinner of the Cricket Writers' Club Book of the Year 2016Shortlisted for the MCC Book of the YearShortlisted for Cricket Book of the Year at the Sports Book AwardsScyld Berry draws on his experiences as a cricket writer of forty years to produce new insights and unfamiliar historical angles on the game, along with moving reflections on episodes from his own life. The author covers a range of themes including cricket in different areas of the world, and abstract concepts such as language, numbers, ethics and psychology; Scyld Berry relishes the joys cricket provides and is convinced of the positive effect it can have in people's lives. Cricket: The Game of Life is an inspiring book that reminds readers why they love the game and prompts them to look at it in a new way.
Crime Seen
by Kate LinesA criminal profiler, trained at Quantico, former Chief Superintendent of the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) Kate Lines recounts her remarkable story using pivotal cases she worked on in the course of her career. How does a farm girl from Ennismore enter a male-dominated field and become a top criminal profiler and groundbreaking leader? For Kate Lines, it started humbly, patrolling highways. She learned quickly that the best way to thrive was to keep calm, carry on and never lose her sense of humour. In what would be the first of many dramatic turns in her career, Kate traded in her uniform for a tight miniskirt and a leather jacket, becoming one of the OPP's first female undercover officers. In 1990 came the opportunity of a lifetime: to be chosen as the 2nd-ever Canadian in an elite program at Quantico, Virginia in what was then the emerging field of criminal profiling. After 10 months of an intensive education in the intricacies of violent crime, Kate's new skills made her much in demand back home. Over the years she was involved in a number of high-profile cases, such as the abduction and murder of Kristen French and of Tori Stafford and the disappearance of Michael Dunahee. Kate was an early proponent of ViCLAS--the Violent Crime Linkage Analysis System, and when she took charge of the new and massive Behavioural Sciences division in Orillia, she took over ViCLAS and turned the department into a hub of innovation. Kate was awarded a Governor General's medal for being in the top 1/10th of 1% of the members of police forces that year. The following year the Canadian Police Leadership Foundation named her Police Leader of the Year. Always taking care not to aggrandize in any way the criminals whose names we may know all too well, Kate feels it's much more important to focus on the courage of victims and their families. Kate is an unsung, groundbreaking Canadian woman, one of a kind in this country, with a unique, inspiring and fascinating story to share.
Crime in Progress: Inside the Steele Dossier and the Fusion GPS Investigation of Donald Trump
by Peter Fritsch Glenn SimpsonBefore Ukraine, before impeachment: This is the never-before-told inside story of the high-stakes, four-year-long investigation into Donald Trump’s Russia ties—culminating in the Steele dossier, and sparking the Mueller report—from the founders of political opposition research company Fusion GPS. <P><P>“Crime in Progress untangles one of the great mysteries of the Trump era—the full story of the Steele dossier—and provides a fascinating insight into the investigatory mind at work.”—Jeffrey ToobinFusion GPS was founded in 2010 by Glenn Simpson and Peter Fritsch, two former reporters at The Wall Street Journal who decided to abandon the struggling news business and use their reporting skills to conduct open-source investigations for businesses and law firms—and opposition research for political candidates. In the fall of 2015, they were hired to look into the finances of Donald Trump. <P><P>What began as a march through a mind-boggling trove of lawsuits, bankruptcies, and sketchy overseas projects soon took a darker turn: The deeper Fusion dug, the more it began to notice names that Simpson and Fritsch had come across during their days covering Russian corruption—and the clearer it became that the focus of Fusion&’s research going forward would be Trump’s entanglements with Russia.To help them make sense of what they were seeing, Simpson and Fritsch engaged the services of a former British intelligence agent and Russia expert named Christopher Steele. <P><P>He would produce a series of memos—which collectively became known as the Steele dossier—that raised deeply alarming questions about the nature of Trump&’s ties to a hostile foreign power. Those memos made their way to U.S. intelligence agencies, and then to President Barack Obama and President-elect Trump. <P><P>On January 10, 2017, the Steele dossier broke into public view, and the Trump-Russia story reached escape velocity. At the time, Fusion GPS was just a ten-person consulting firm tucked away above a Starbucks near Dupont Circle, but it would soon be thrust into the center of the biggest news story on the planet—a story that would lead to accusations of witch hunts, a relentless campaign of persecution by congressional Republicans, bizarre conspiracy theories, lawsuits by Russian oligarchs, and the Mueller report.In Crime in Progress, Simpson and Fritsch tell their story for the first time—a tale of the high-stakes pursuit of one of the biggest, most important stories of our time—no matter the costs. <P><P><b> A New York Times Bestseller </b>
Crime or Compassion?: One woman's story of a loving friendship that knew no bounds
by Gail O'Rorke'I was torn. My best friend needed me. But little did I know then what the consequences of helping her would be...'In 2015, Gail O'Rorke stood trial on three counts of assisting in the suicide of her friend Bernadette Forde, who had taken her life in 2011 in the late stages of Multiple Sclerosis. Facing the possibility of fourteen years in prison for a crime she didn't commit, Gail was also grieving for the friend she'd lost.Here in Crime or Compassion? she takes us on the journey behind the events that led to her arrest: from her remarkable early years - growing up with an abusive father and her escape to a better life - to her enduring friendship with Bernadette and the highs and lows of caring for someone you love, to the moment she was arrested by Garda officers, signalling three of the worst years of her life.This is a story of friendship and selflessness, of the rules of a society sometimes at odds with the nature of personal suffering, and a gripping insight into the inner world of the courtroom: the characters, the colour, and the emotions that accompany standing in the dock, facing a jury of your peers.
Crime or Compassion?: One woman's story of a loving friendship that knew no bounds
by Gail O'Rorke'I was torn. My best friend needed me. But little did I know then what the consequences of helping her would be...'In 2015, Gail O'Rorke stood trial on three counts of assisting in the suicide of her friend Bernadette Forde, who had taken her life in 2011 in the late stages of Multiple Sclerosis. Facing the possibility of fourteen years in prison for a crime she didn't commit, Gail was also grieving for the friend she'd lost.Here in Crime or Compassion? she takes us on the journey behind the events that led to her arrest: from her remarkable early years - growing up with an abusive father and her escape to a better life - to her enduring friendship with Bernadette and the highs and lows of caring for someone you love, to the moment she was arrested by Garda officers, signalling three of the worst years of her life.This is a story of friendship and selflessness, of the rules of a society sometimes at odds with the nature of personal suffering, and a gripping insight into the inner world of the courtroom: the characters, the colour, and the emotions that accompany standing in the dock, facing a jury of your peers.
Crime, Deviance and Doping: Fallen Sports Stars, Autobiography and the Management of Stigma
by Majid YarYar examines the autobiographies of fallen sports stars, exploring their fall from grace and the stigma it entails. Drawing upon sociological and criminological perspectives, it illuminates how fallen stars use confessional acts of story-telling to seek forgiveness, vindication and redemption.
Crimelord: The True Story of Tam McGraw
by David LeslieCrimelord is the gripping life story of elusive multimillionaire gangster Tam McGraw. A notorious criminal kingpin, McGraw has risen from extreme poverty in the East End of Glasgow to become one of Scotland's wealthiest men. When hash started to flood into Scotland from the late 1980s onwards, suspicion centred on McGraw, leader of the infamous Barlanark Team. After a two-year surveillance operation, police discovered the drug had been hidden in buses carrying young footballers and deprived Glasgow families on free holidays abroad. It was a scam reminiscent of the movie The Italian Job, only this time Scots kids had been sitting on hash worth over £40 million. Police claimed McGraw was the financier and mastermind but in 1998 a jury declared him innocent while other suspects were jailed. As McGraw refuses to discuss his life publicly, his remarkable tale is told through friends, fellow crooks and the occasional rival. It is an outrageous, often hilarious, true gangster story.
Crimes Against Liberty: An Indictment of President Barack Obama
by David LimbaughLimbaugh issues a damning indictment of President Barack Obama for encroaching upon and stripping of individual and sovereign rights of Americans.
Crimes Against Women: Three Tragedies and the Call for Reform in India
by The TheAs 2012 came to a close, news of the gang rape of a young woman in India’s capital generated headlines around the world. Her assault on a moving bus with a metal rod, and her death two weeks later from her injuries, focused attention on the dark side of the world’s largest democracy: the struggle that faces many Indian women in a country where chauvinistic and misogynistic attitudes prevail.The Wall Street Journal’s India bureau explored this horrendous crime and others that explore the experience of Indian women in the 21st century. The reporting in all the stories stands out for its gripping detail and its emotional pull. In many cases, central figures involved in these everyday dramas were speaking for the first time.The book begins with the story of a Catholic nun murdered in rural India as she tried to preserve ancient tribal ways in the face of mining expansion, while also coming to the aid of a woman who had allegedly been raped.Next is a riveting account of a young woman from rural Bihar who was duped into moving to Delhi, where she was forced to marry or go into prostitution -- and the disaster for her and her family that ensued. The woman broke her long-held silence to speak to the WSJ about what happened.The book ends with the WSJ’s world-beating coverage of the New Delhi rape case, including intimate portraits of the victim and her friend who tried to save her but couldn’t. He granted the WSJ intimate and exclusive access to tell his side of the story.In this e-book, we are bringing together these stories -- in many cases updated with fresh details of the individuals’ lives -- to show the hopes and the catastrophes, the bravery and the abuse that are the daily lot of millions of India’s women.
Crimes of Passion: An Unblinking Look at Murderous Love
by Howard EngelThirty real-life accounts of passion gone lethally wrong Celebrated mystery writer Howard Engel traces the history of the crime of passion through France, England, Canada, and the United States in his first nonfiction book. The story of Ruth Ellis, the last woman hanged in England, is explored along with more familiar, modern cases, such as those of O. J. Simpson and Lorena Bobbitt. With each sordid tale, Engel explores the legal codes and moral implications surrounding crimes of passion throughout history. Careful research and a novelist&’s eye for detail and dramatization bring each grisly case into chilling clarity.Crimes of Passion is a must-read for true crime enthusiasts, armchair historians, and fans of the macabre.
Criminal
by Caspar WalshWhen Caspar Walsh was three years old his father became his primary carer. But Caspar's father wasn't classic dad material. He robbed banks, he dealt drugs and made his living from deception and violence. He loved his son but not enough to change his criminal lifestyle. Despite all this Caspar trusted him, loved him and looked up to him. When he grew up, he wanted to be just like his dad. Caspar got what he wanted. CRIMINAL is the harrowing story of a wild childhood punctuated by drugs, violence, sexual abuse and the frequent absences of a father in prison. It's the story of how Caspar inevitably became part of his father's world: doing drugs, dealing drugs, doing time. And how, eventually, as a young man, Caspar dragged himself out of the gutter, out of prison and out of crime and made the decision to rehabilitate himself and, by coming full circle to work with offenders, help change the lives of others like him.
Criminal Sociology
by Enrico FerriA new departure in science is a simple phenomenon of nature, determined in its origin and progress, like all such phenomena, by conditions of time and place. Attention must be drawn to these conditions at the outset, for it is only by accurately defining them that the scientific conscience of the student of sociology is developed and confirmed. The experimental philosophy of the latter half of our century, combined with human biology and psychology, and with the natural study of human society, had already produced an intellectual atmosphere decidedly favourable to a practical inquiry into the criminal manifestations of individual and social life. To these general conditions must be added the plain and everyday contrast between the metaphysical perfection of criminal law and the progressive increase of crime, as well as the contrast between legal theories of crime and the study of the mental characteristics of a large number of criminals.
Criminal That I Am
by Jennifer RidhaA candid memoir from a talented young lawyer who becomes romantically entangled with the convicted drug felon she represents--Cameron Douglas, son of film actor Michael Douglas--and who soon makes the mistake of her life. Or does she?Criminal That I Am is a defense attorney's account of the criminal justice system as seen through the prism of a particular case: her own. Jennifer Ridha is enlisted to defend Cameron Douglas in a federal drug trafficking case while he is incarcerated in a maximum-security prison under difficult, even dangerous, conditions. As media scrutiny and the pressures of Cameron's case mount and as Jennifer becomes increasingly transfixed by her charismatic but troubled client, he asks her to do the unthinkable: commit a crime. In a decision inexplicable even to herself, guided only by her indignation and infatuation, she agrees. When her transgression is discovered, her criminal case begins, and her life as she knows it is over. A page-turning trip through professional self-destruction, tabloid scandal, and self-reckoning, Criminal That I Am is about the choices one woman makes: how they define her, how she lives with them, and, ultimately, how she is transformed by them. Recounted with brutal introspection and self-deprecating humor, this strange and twisted love story contemplates what we make of crime and punishment...and what it makes of us.
Criminal Women, 1850–1920: Researching the Lives of Britain's Female Offenders
by Lucy Williams Barry GodfreyWomen are among the hardest individuals to trace through the historical record and this is especially true of female offenders who had a vested interest in not wanting to be found. That is why this thought-provoking and accessible handbook by Lucy Williams and Barry Godfrey is of such value. It looks beyond the crimes and the newspaper reports of women criminals in the Victorian era in order to reveal the reality of their personal and penal journeys, and it provides a guide for researchers who are keen to explore this intriguing and neglected subject.The book is split into three sections. There is an introduction outlining the historical context for the study of female crime and punishment, then a series of real-life case studies which show in a vivid way the complexity of female offenders lives and follows them through the penal system. The third section is a detailed guide to archival and online sources that readers can consult in order to explore the life-histories of criminal women.The result is a rare combination of academic guide and how-to-do-it manual. It introduces readers to the latest research in the field and it gives them all the information they need to carry out their own research.
Criminal Women: Famous London Cases
by John J. EddlestonShocking portraits of women who have committed capital crimes in England’s capital city—from the author of Jack the Ripper: An Encyclopedia. Women have sometimes been seen as less criminally inclined than men. But, as John J. Eddleston shows in this revealing anthology of female crimes in London, this image is hard to mesh with reality, for the city’s history is crowded with cases of women who broke the law. In vivid detail, he reconstructs a series of dramatic, often harrowing, cases in which women were involved and puts their acts in the context of their times. Taking episodes from the eighteenth century to near the present day, he looks at criminal women of all types, from all walks of life. The work of the London police, the courts, and the prisons is an essential element in his study, and each chapter reveals much about how attitudes toward crime and punishment have changed over the centuries. Fascinating portraits of these criminal women as individuals emerge from their stories; their cases come to life—as does the London in which they lived. They include Catherine Hayes, who was burnt alive for murdering her husband; three women hanged on the same day for highway robbery; two women executed for rioting; Anne Hurle and Charlotte Newman, who were both hanged for forgery; Florence Bravo, who was sensationally acquitted of murder; and, perhaps most famous of all, Ruth Ellis, whose execution in 1955 provoked an outcry against capital punishment.
Criminal: How Our Prisons Are Failing Us All
by Angela Kirwin'Compelling, urgent and devastating. A triumph' The Secret Barrister'Funny, heart-breaking and utterly authentic' Dr Amanda Brown, author of THE PRISON DOCTOR'A breath-taking account of the UK's crumbling prison system. Every politician and decision-maker involved in our prisons should be placed on 23-hour lockdown and made to read this book' Nick Pettigrew, author of ANTI-SOCIAL"I was what the older generation of prison officers called a 'care bear'. It was my job to work with the prisoners most in danger of falling through the cracks and, if not deliver them safely to the community upon release, fully rehabilitated, then at least stop them from killing themselves or anyone else..."Come with Angela Kirwin for a journey inside prison like no other. For over a decade she was a social care worker in some of Britain's most notorious prisons. Now she wants to tell the stories of the men she met, because she believes that prison is failing everyone, damaging the most vulnerable people in our societies, creating habitual criminals, leaving us all less safe and contributing to a society that is immeasurably less humane. Every year, we spend billions of pounds on a system that fundamentally doesn't work. Rather than a separate world full of people that aren't like us, prison is where the most damaged and vulnerable people in our society end up and we all need to urgently care about that, so we can change it. Because the state of our prisons is criminal.
Criminals: My Family's Life on Both Sides of the Law
by Robert Anthony SiegelA prismatic, provocative look at one family—led by a charismatic, defense attorney father—whose bonds exist on both sides of the lawThe Siegels of New York are a singular creation—quirky, idealistic, shaped in large part by Robert Anthony Siegel's father, a lovable, impossible man of gargantuan appetites and sloppy ethics, a criminal defense attorney who loved his drug–dealing clients a little too much and went to prison as a result. Siegel's mother decided to pour her energies into making her children art–loving mavens of fine dining in international settings—all the things that his father was not—with Robert as her most targeted ally. Once out of prison, Siegel's father struggled with depression, attempting to reenter legal practice, with age and finances nipping at his heels. Robert, as a son and later as an author, attempts to put all of these pieces together to make a coherent shape of family before realizing that perhaps no such thing exists.Where is the thin, permeable line between right and wrong? How does one family join the greater world of normal people beyond the demimonde of drug dealers, bikers, schemers, rock musicians, and artists that swirled around them? Criminals explores those questions without easy judgments, creating a prism of an eccentric collection of characters bound together as the mysterious tribe of family.