Genealogy Books - For the Sins of My Father: A Mafia Killer, His Son, and the Legacy of a Mob Life

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Spotlight customer reviews:
Customer Rating:

Summary: Poor
Comment: Getting a book published merely because your daddy was a gangster is a bit of crime. Me buying it
and toiling through the amateurish prose even more of a crime.

Customer Rating:

Summary: don't bother
Comment: The kid doesn't know anything about his father other then what the police knew. you can find a lot
better book about Demeo

Customer Rating:

Summary: A mob tragedy
Comment: I have always had an interest in the mob and this book really counters the glorification with a grim
reality of a mob life and "The mobsters son."
The last 120 pages i read non-stop, because i
couldn't put the book down.

Customer Rating:

Summary: Finally, a look from different eyes
Comment: You've probably gotten a good grasp of the traditional Mafioso scene by now. Anyone who's seen the
Godfather or watched an episode of The Sopranos must figure s/he has a good sense of what every
mafia-related story is all about.
However, it would be wise to toss away those preconceptions
of Italian-American novels when picking up Albert DeMeo's "For the Sins of My Father." This story
does not spend hundreds of pages and hours of your time detailing a glamorous life in the mob gone
wrong. Instead, the novel is an original, sad, and honest look at Albert's father, Roy, who was a
member of the mob who was later killed by his fellow gangsters in 1982. What sets this book apart
from traditional Italian Mafioso stories is the fact that it comes from the perspective of a
mobster's son who, from a young age, is exposed to this lifestyle without ever truly discovering
what it means for his father and the rest of the family until it is too late. By adding the element
of a mobster's family, DeMeo gives readers a new way to read into the life of America's most
recognizable, and most stereotypical, groups.
Throughout the novel, DeMeo reveals his courage
and describes the heartache of being in a family with close ties to the mob, paying special
attention to the psychological ramifications. DeMeo's struggles not only to live under his father's
Mafioso umbrella but also to live through the pain of the memories after his father's murder make
for an emotional, genuine inside look at the real effect the mob has on those families that are tied
to it.
Never mind the glamour that the life of a gangster occasionally granted Albert's
father, Roy. Never mind the power that Roy held in the form of being a "made man." For Albert, it
would've been easy to trade all of that away to live a life without the fear of the mafia constantly
in the rear-view mirror. For all of those in our society that glorify the mob, this book reveals the
truth behind the decision to join organized crime and just how far reaching the consequences can be.

Customer Rating:

Summary: the "inside job"
Comment: This book was assigned for my italian-american history class, and even though it was at the end of
the semester, it was definitely the best-read book of the semester!

When one reads a
book, they sometimes wonder whether a book about someone's life isn't dramatized or messed around
with to make it more exciting. That is precisely what i thought; why would the son of the largest
auto theft ring in New York, give a detailed account of his father's inside jobs? Wouldn't that
just incriminate himself, knowing so much? Yet this isn't a book you would expect to read about a
"mafia" family. Albert Demeo rips out and exposes most of the scars of his past, and many of the
events in his life due to his father's involvement in crime. While he does mention a lot of the
so-called "hits" that he heard about growing up, the story also brings the reader to another side
that is rarely exposed in such violent memories of the past. Albert mainly discusses the father-son
relationship he held with his father, and how it molded his life to this day.

One part
of the novel that made me envious of it's writer was that he mentioned when he was six years old he
recieved five thousand dollars for christmas! How many young children can say that this kind of
money was waiting for them under the tree. But it wasn't necessarily this high life that Albert
really focused on. Albert and his father Roy were very inseperable in the earlier years of his
life. He even accompanied his father on various outings, and met many of the "clients" who either
are dead today or in jail. Al grows up to idolize his father, and practically becomes obsessed with
his safety, waiting up even at a young age "just to see the headlights in the driveway and know he
was safe." His idolization of this man becomes hardly tainted when he realizes what his father does
for a living, and it drives him to paranoia for his father's life. This paranoid lifestyle goes on
to affect him far beyond his father's death, and affects almost every aspect of his life.
/>This book stood out to me, and i would highly suggest it to any reader, because it doesn't just
glamorize this high profile lifestyle of many of the "gangsters" that existed. Albert brings a
real-life account to what it was like growing up knowing his dad could be dead the next day, and
while this is true in everyone's case, because of his chosen profession the stakes were even higher.
The story of his life helps the reader to see how some mafia operations are run, but also helps the
reader to see the softer side to a father linked to so many crimes.

Albert DeMeo gives
a blunt but gentle account of the life of a mobster's son, and what its really like to live in the
spotlight of the FBI.

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