A fascinating, page-turning story of a genuine scoundrel.
The life of a ruthless mobster, based on personal interviews.
When Boris Nayfeld was born in 1947 in Gomel, Belarus, his father was thousands of miles away “doing time in a Soviet gulag for black marketeering.” His mother abandoned him and his brother three years later, leaving them in the care of their grandmother. “I never loved [my mother],” he said later in life. “To be honest, I’m only grateful for one thing: she didn’t have an abortion.” Perhaps unsurprisingly, it wasn’t long before he was hanging out with gang members, on his way to his own first experience with Soviet prisons. Century, the author of Hunting El Chapo and other bestselling true-crime books, thrillingly chronicles Nayfeld’s criminal career in the Soviet Union, where stealing from the state was a main source of illicit income. However, living visibly beyond one’s nominal means was a good way to earn unwelcome attention, and in 1979, Nayfeld and his family took part in a general exodus of Jews to the U.S. It wasn’t long before he found himself in Brighton Beach, where “bilking the system was widely admired, a demonstration of intelligence and adaptability.” Nayfeld quickly allied himself with those who could ease his path, especially Evsei Agron, a pickpocket from Leningrad who’d become a kingpin in Brooklyn. Under Agron’s mentorship, Nayfeld took part in a stunning variety of scams, from passing counterfeit Russian coins to recent immigrants to insurance fraud, eventually hitting a real jackpot with fuel-tax evasion. Century wisely lets his subject tell most of the story in his own vivid words, painting his career in crime as a regular job, with prison just a cost of doing business and violence one useful item in the toolbox. True-crime fans will find this one irresistible, and the lengthy glossary of terms is a welcome addition.
A fascinating, page-turning story of a genuine scoundrel.Pub Date: July 5, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-063-01495-4
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: June 28, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2022
A juicy story with some truly crazy moments, yet Anderson's good heart shines through.
The iconic model tells the story of her eventful life.
According to the acknowledgments, this memoir started as "a fifty-page poem and then grew into hundreds of pages of…more poetry." Readers will be glad that Anderson eventually turned to writing prose, since the well-told anecdotes and memorable character sketches are what make it a page-turner. The poetry (more accurately described as italicized notes-to-self with line breaks) remains strewn liberally through the pages, often summarizing the takeaway or the emotional impact of the events described: "I was / and still am / an exceptionally / easy target. / And, / I'm proud of that." This way of expressing herself is part of who she is, formed partly by her passion for Anaïs Nin and other writers; she is a serious maven of literature and the arts. The narrative gets off to a good start with Anderson’s nostalgic memories of her childhood in coastal Vancouver, raised by very young, very wild, and not very competent parents. Here and throughout the book, the author displays a remarkable lack of anger. She has faced abuse and mistreatment of many kinds over the decades, but she touches on the most appalling passages lightly—though not so lightly you don't feel the torment of the media attention on the events leading up to her divorce from Tommy Lee. Her trip to the pages of Playboy, which involved an escape from a violent fiance and sneaking across the border, is one of many jaw-dropping stories. In one interesting passage, Julian Assange's mother counsels Anderson to desexualize her image in order to be taken more seriously as an activist. She decided that “it was too late to turn back now”—that sexy is an inalienable part of who she is. Throughout her account of this kooky, messed-up, enviable, and often thrilling life, her humility (her sons "are true miracles, considering the gene pool") never fails her.
A juicy story with some truly crazy moments, yet Anderson's good heart shines through.Pub Date: Jan. 31, 2023
ISBN: 9780063226562
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Dey Street/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Dec. 5, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2023
SEEN & HEARD
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.
The veteran actor, comedian, and banjo player teams up with the acclaimed illustrator to create a unique book of cartoons that communicates their personalities.
Martin, also a prolific author, has always been intrigued by the cartoons strewn throughout the pages of the New Yorker. So when he was presented with the opportunity to work with Bliss, who has been a staff cartoonist at the magazine since 1997, he seized the moment. “The idea of a one-panel image with or without a caption mystified me,” he writes. “I felt like, yeah, sometimes I’m funny, but there are these other weird freaks who are actually funny.” Once the duo agreed to work together, they established their creative process, which consisted of working forward and backward: “Forwards was me conceiving of several cartoon images and captions, and Harry would select his favorites; backwards was Harry sending me sketched or fully drawn cartoons for dialogue or banners.” Sometimes, he writes, “the perfect joke occurs two seconds before deadline.” There are several cartoons depicting this method, including a humorous multipanel piece highlighting their first meeting called “They Meet,” in which Martin thinks to himself, “He’ll never be able to translate my delicate and finely honed droll notions.” In the next panel, Bliss thinks, “I’m sure he won’t understand that the comic art form is way more subtle than his blunt-force humor.” The team collaborated for a year and created 150 cartoons featuring an array of topics, “from dogs and cats to outer space and art museums.” A witty creation of a bovine family sitting down to a gourmet meal and one of Dumbo getting his comeuppance highlight the duo’s comedic talent. What also makes this project successful is the team’s keen understanding of human behavior as viewed through their unconventional comedic minds.
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26289-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
