Due for release on 28th June The Ice Man is the unbelievable true story of Richard Kuklinski. For 30 years, Kuklinski led a double life beyond anything ever seen on The Sopranos. Whilst establishing a reputation as one of the most notorious professional assassins in American history, he continued to host neighbourhood barbecues in suburban New Jersey and dote on his wife and daughters.

In other words he was a top Mafia hitman but at the same time, a doting father and husband.

As well as spending hundreds of hours interviewing Kuklinski in prison before his death, and interviewing police and underworld sources, Philip Carlo, a world expert on serial killers, also spent time with Kuklinski’s family. The result is an intimate and authoritative portrait of a man who was capable of showing love and affection and yet also of the most unspeakable evils.

Kuklinski made killing his career, and he never disappointed his customers. For an additional fee he would happily make his victims suffer, this is in complete contrast to his loving father figure image, the one people of his neighbourhood became familiarised with. This book is over 400 pages long and seems a daunting task, but I guarantee once your eyes hit the page, you’ll be sucked in and never want to put it down.

Until this review section begun I wasn’t one for reading books and all the hassles that came with it, I’d managed to read the books of my heroes (Phillips, Quinn and Keane) but that was as far as I’d ever go. But when The Ice Man landed on my desk I was immediately drawn to it. Philip Carlo is one of the world’s foremost experts on serial killers and is the author of a number of other true-crime books and this book is amazingly gripping and fascinatingly real.

Kuklinski was hired by John Gotti to kill his neighbour who accidentally ran over his child; he was Sammy ‘the Bull’ Gravano’s partner in the Sparks Steak House assassination of Paul Castellano; and he was involved in the notorious murder of Jimmy Hoffa. On first reading it seems like something out of the Godfather with all the Mafia names flying around, however it is a true story and a true indication into the life of a Mafia hitman.

It is difficult to reconcile the two lives of Richard ‘the Ice Man’ Kuklinski – the husband, father and neighbour, but also the ruthless, unfeeling killer – and yet Carlo has succeeded in portraying both the man and the monster. Through his painstaking research and extensive personal interviews, Carlo has put together an exhaustive profile of one of America’s most infamous professional hitman.

Book courtesy of Fiona Atherton at Mainstream Publishing.
www.mainstreampublishing.com

James Henderson

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