Review of Nine Lives

[Stephanie Cameron]

[Following is an official OnlineBookClub.org review of "Nine Lives" by Salvatore B Giuliano.]

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2 out of 4 stars

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Salvatore B. Giuliano describes different experiences faced while living a life of crime in Nine Lives. The way Giuliano expresses the criminal lifestyle is informative and intriguing. Between the luxuries and the dangers, nothing is off-limits. Nine Lives gives insight into various organized crime groups.

Juliano Crusifero is a young Italian living in Chicago. He has family connections to the Italian mob, which, at the time, ruled over the city. Juliano grew up around criminals and would even run errands for his Uncle Joe, who was a wise guy in the mob. You could say Juliano was a mini entrepreneur as he was good at making and flipping money from a young age. He would spend the majority of his life in the criminal underworld as a professional thief turned smuggler. As Juliano would get older and eventually have the FBI after him, he would decide to change his ways.

I enjoyed Juliano's honesty about his experiences and actions. It was interesting to learn about the different codes (rules) that the mob enforced. I liked how he paid homage to the people that impacted his life the most. Also, I enjoyed how the author would use quotes or phrases to help exenterate his views. For example, " When you're on top, your friends know who you are. When you're on the bottom, you know who your friends are" is my favorite phrase from this book.

I did not like all the explanations of people and their nicknames. A lot of the introductions of people got repeated, which would make me lose interest and make that section seem to drag on. I felt there could have been more details about Juliano's home life. For instance, what did his parents think of his actions? And what happened to the mother of his first two kids? The author mentions meeting a girl and becoming a father, and that's it until he meets his current wife. I wish the author elaborated more to help understand Juliano's personality and character as a family man.

For the reasons listed above, I rate this book a 2 out of 4. The repetition of the characters interfered with my reading. There are typos in the book that lead me to suggest more editing is needed.

Criminal fiction enthusiasts would enjoy this book. It has plenty of action and adventure. Profanity is heavy throughout the book and includes some amounts of gore. I would suggest this to mature readers.

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Nine Lives
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[NetMassimo]

This crime thriller has good potential, so some more editing might help a lot in fixing the problems you pointed out. Thank you for your honest review!