Richard Kuklinski was a famous mafia affiliated contract killer who was called a “homicide superstar”. Throughout his life he committed many famous assassinations on high ranking mobsters. In the autobiography The Ice Man: Confessions of a Mafia Contract Killer, author Philip Carlo takes you deep into the life and psychology of a cold blooded killer.
Richard was born in New Jersey and lived with his brothers; Florian was the oldest and Joseph the youngest of the three siblings. Richard lived with a loving mother but a horrible father, whom he’d later blame for the outcome of his life. In his house his father was an alcoholic with a bad temper that would mercilessly beat his wife. Then one night his father would kill the oldest of the three sons. This would be the first of many violent acts involved in Richard’s life.
As Richard would grow in his adolescence he would find himself bullied by a local group of ruffians. They would make fun of him because of his nationality (Polish-American). After being heckled by this group of kids he would eventually grow sick of the torture and find his true nature as a killer. One day Richard would find the head of the group of bullies and beat him down with a wooden pole, so badly it would kill the bully. His murder was his first, at the young age of thirteen.
Richard would grow up as cold as ice, and quickly earned a reputation as a ruthless assassin. He would find himself tied in as a contract killer with many of the leading mafias on the east coast. However he would eventually find himself in jail on a life sentence for five counts murder, even though he was involved in numerous unsolved murder cases.
I would recommend the book The Ice Man to anyone who enjoys reading about organized crime in America. This book is focused on just one contract killer’s life and shows a more graphic side of the “mob’s dirty work”.
The book has short chapters and is a quick read. I read this novel because I heard a couple friends talking about this book. This book lives up to the hype and was a very interesting read. The life of Richard was an intense one and was very compelling to read about.