Review
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"Any gangsta rap fan knows that the genre largely
glamorizes the violent, fast-lane lifestyles of street hustlers
and bange.” -Smooth Magazine
“A few years ago, Alice K. Turner wrote a book entitled The
History of Hell. The book traces the idea of hell throughout
history. In like manner, Jeffrey Burton Russell wrote The Devil:
Perceptions of Evil from Antiquity to Primitive Christianity. His
book traces the idea of the Devil in a period of history. Turner
and Burton are highly educated, erudite, and talented. They write
about abstract ideas.
There's another writer, who wrote a book combining the subjects
of Turner’s book and Burton’s book. His name is Seth Ferranti aka
Soul Man. He, too, is erudite and talented only in a different
kind of way. Seth has been incarcerated in the feds, which is the
federal prison system since 1993. If everything goes smoothly, he
will be released in 2015.
In his book, Street Legends, Seth writes about the same subjects
as Turner and Burton, hell and the Devil. Only Seth doesn’t write
about ideas, he writes about reality. There is a hell on earth.
It's called a supermax prison. And it’s where they keep the
Devil. Only in this case, there’s more than one Devil there’s
six. The names of the Devils are: Kenneth “Supreme” McGriff,
Wayne “Silk” Perry, Anthony Jones, Aaron Jones, Peter “Pistol
Pete” Rollack, and George “Boy George” Rivera. And they make the
Biblical Devil look like a three-year-old toddler at a Sunday
school picnic.
Seth Soul Man Ferranti tells the actual story of each man. The
stories twirl around cocaine and heroin, oodles and oodles of
money, plump cars, and bling bling. Unfortunately, in each case,
the merry-go-round of fun turns into a Tilt-a-Whirl of violence
and murder as the street hustlers ride the streets. In the end,
each of the six Devils is imprisoned in hell on earth for life.
Ferranti's style is raw and edgy, full of street slang and prison
jargon, which is fascinating to read. What really keeps the book
moving and the reader engaged is Ferranti's talent for
storytelling. As he relates the story, Ferranti seems to be
idolizing the lifestyles and actions of these street stars. And
in a sense, he is, but only because he's showing the reader how
members of certain socio-economic groups look at these men. To
these people, these men are legends. They are street stars,
because they re living the life.
Then, though, as each man's life spirals into a black hole from
which there is no return, Ferranti politely acknowledges the
utter folly of such a lifestyle. He shows each man for the fraud
and charlatan he was. Oh, Ferranti respects their code of omerta
(silence), and the fact that they were willing to go to prison
for it. Yet Ferranti implies that only totally immoral
individuals operate on a pseudo-moral system founded on omerta or
silence. Only corrupt people worry about someone sn on
them. And anyone who knows enough to snitch about such people
has, at the very least, been dabbling in corruption.
At the same time, Ferranti does not pretend that the agents of
justice the authorities are impeccable angelic beings, who always
play by the rules. In Street Legends, carrying a badge does not
guarantee a squeaky-clean character. Ferranti points out that the
authorities sometimes stack the deck when it serves their
purposes. In other words, this is not a story about good guys and
bad guys. It’s a story about waste. This does not, however,
dilute the moral of Ferranti's book.
The moral of the story is that living the life, if that life is
based on drugs and murder, is nothing more than a fleeting
mirage. When the mirage disappears, all that's left is a sign
that reads Welcome to Hell.
Street Legends is the story of the cry of utter desolation coming
from those now residing in that hell.” -Alvah's Books
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About the Author
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Seth Ferranti is a former LSD kingpin turned
journalist and writer. He has been writing since 1999 for
magazines such as Don Diva and F.E.D.S. He has been incarcerated
since 1993. His blog at gorillaconvict.com is widely read as are
his books. Check out Seth at facebook.com/seth.ferranti.
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