My Bloody Life: The Making of a Latin King

by Reymundo Sanchez

Overview

Looking for an escape from childhood abuse, Reymundo Sanchez turned away from school and baseball to drugs, alcohol, and then sex, and was left to fend for himself before age 14. The Latin Kings, one of the largest and most notorious street gangs in America, became his refuge and his world, but its violence cost him friends, freedom, self-respect, and nearly his life. This is a raw and powerful odyssey through the ranks of the new mafia, where the only people more dangerous than rival gangs are members of your own gang, who in one breath will say they’ll die for you and in the next will order your assassination.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781556524271
Publisher:	Chicago Review Press, Incorporated
Publication date:	07/01/2000
Series:	Illinois
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	73,989
Product dimensions:	6.01(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.00(d)
Age Range:	14 - 18 Years

Read an Excerpt

The Vicelords hung out on Hoyne and Crystal streets not far from the Unknowns 'hood. That's where we headed. Pebbles and I sat in the rear of the van, Hercules drove, and Morena sat on the front passenger seat. Leo called Pebbles up to the front. I heard him say "give this to that brother so he can take care of business." Pebbles came back to where I was and handed me a sawed off shotgun. I was scared out of my mind. I was about to be tested again. Damn I wished I was in Puerto Rico!

A few seconds later the van stopped. Hercules came to the back and asked for the shotgun. I was relieved thinking that I wouldn't have to use it on anybody, but he only had forgotten to load it. Hercules loaded the shotgun and demonstrated how to use it. "See my brother you pull the trigger then pump it, pull the trigger again then pump it again until its empty," Hercules instructed me. Shotgun shells flew out of the top of the gun every time he pumped it. (He never actually pulled the trigger.) Hercules reloaded it, gave it to me, and again we were on our way. Pebbles lit up a joint and sat next to me. She gave me the joint and started kissing me on my neck and whispering about what she would do to me if I shot a Vicelord for her. I stared at the shotgun, not knowing what to do.

Pebbles took it out of my hands, put it under a blanket then kissed me. I was tongue kissing and feeling up Pebbles' body when Morena came back and told us that we had arrived at our destination. She advised me to get ready then she went back into the front.

Pebbles looked out the window and pointed out the Vicelords for me. She grabbed my groin, squeezed gently, kissed me, and told me that the sooner I got it over with, the quicker I could have her. I made up my mind right there and then to go ahead with the whole thing.

What People are Saying About This

Jesse White

A brutal, chilling firsthand account of how a young person who is raised without positive family values will reach out to a gang to find a support system and a substitute family. This book offers new insights into what lures kids into gangs and how difficult it can be for them to get out alive. It shockingly explains how difficult life can be for disadvantaged youngsters and demands that we make a greater effort at improving their lives.
— (Jesse White, Illinois Secretary of State and founder of the Jesse White Tumblers, an anti-gang and -drug program)

Editorial Reviews

A brutal, chilling firsthand account of how a young person who is raised without positive family values will reach out to a gang to find a support system and a substitute family. This book offers new insights into what lures kids into gangs and how difficult it can be for them to get out alive. It shockingly explains how difficult life can be for disadvantaged youngsters and demands that we make a greater effort at improving their lives.” —Jesse White, Illinois Secretary of State and founder of the Jesse White Tumblers, an anti-gang and -drug program



“A slow-motion riot of drugs, sex, and gunplay.” —Publishers Weekly

“Sanchez writes plainly and powerfully.” —Booklist


“A viciously candid, self-deprecating memoir.” —Chicago magazine

From the Publisher

The courageously honest Once a King, Always a King: The Unmaking of a Latin King resumes his 2000 memoir of gang wars, My Bloody Life. — Stephen J. Lyons

The Washington Post

Tells us perhaps more than we might want to know about gang life.

ralphmag.org

A brutal, chilling firsthand account of how a young person who is raised without positive family values will reach out to a gang to find a support system and a substitute family. This book offers new insights into what lures kids into gangs and how difficult it can be for them to get out alive. It shockingly explains how difficult life can be for disadvantaged youngsters and demands that we make a greater effort at improving their lives.

Jesse White

A viciously candid, self-deprecating memoir.

Chicago Magazine

A viciously candid, self-deprecating memoir.

Chicago

Chicago in the 1980s provides the setting for this extremely disturbing and raw account of a Puerto Rican teenager who lost himself to violent gang activity. Now repentant, Sanchez (a pseudonym) writes in a voluble voice, replete with operatic asides declaiming the immorality of his actions. But he offers a forceful and unusual perspective on Chicago--in Sanchez's telling, it's a place of territorial graffiti and racist cops, in which a slow-motion riot of drugs, sex and gunplay constantly unfolds. Sanchez recounts his family's arrival in Chicago's Northwest Side in the late 1970s, when he was a small boy; he describes the beatings his grifter stepfather regularly doled out; and he portrays the allure of the mysterious and ritual-bound lives of tough, teenaged gangsters. When his family returned to Puerto Rico, he stayed behind. Soon, he joined the fearsome Latin Kings, and his given street name "Lil Loco" attested to his youth and ferocity. While graphically describing what he witnessed as a gang member--senseless killings, inter-ethnic hatreds and sexual abuse of gang-affiliated women--Sanchez also pursues harder truths, arguing that it is a minority of promiscuous drug-users accompanied by community-wide silence that keeps the gangs in business. In the end, he condemns his former gang for masquerading as a Latino "public service" organization while high-ranking members become rich from their youthful recruits' drug dealing. And he scoffs at their reliance on conformist rituals and violence (violations of the rituals were punished with full body beatings). Offering very little hope, this book captures the dark, self-destructive lot of countless urban teens. Like other gangland memoirs (such as Monster and Always Running), it is significant because it takes the reader deep inside a secretive and brutal ethnic gang subculture. (Aug.) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Both (7/27/00) and (7/17/00) have good reviews of the original, 2000, edition of this raw memoir. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews