Product Description

A Few Kind Words and a Loaded Gun is the autobiography of convicted felon Noel ‘Razor’ Smith. An extraordinarily vivid account of how a tearaway kid from South London became a career criminal, it is both a searing indictment of a system that determinedly brutalized young offenders and a frank, unsentimental acknowledgement of the thrills of the criminal life. Shocking, fascinating and frightening by turns, it also reveals Razor Smith to be a remarkably talented writer.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #175045 in Books
• Published on: 2005-07-28
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 496 pages

Review
""This is not another lame true crime book written by someone who has spent their life in an office. Razor Smith is the real thing: someone who has lived the life and lived to write about it. A Few Kind Words "is a stunning book, filled with brutality, horror, and truth. It might be the best crime memoir ever written by an actual criminal." --James Frey, author, A Million Little Pieces

Publishers Weekly
"Captures the irony and waste of the author’s life."

PAGES
"A knock-‘em-dead writing style that gives you riveting insight into the development of a career criminal."

Customer Reviews

Genre-busting; a worthwhile read
The increasing ubiquity of the true crime genre on booksellers' shelves is all too often proof positive of the old adage of the impossibility of losing money by underestimating the intelligence of the general public. This book is, for a number of reasons, a notable exception.

To outline the background, the author was born in South London in the early sixties and took the active decision to become a career criminal in the late seventies. Not one to do things by halves, he opted for the premiership of criminal activity and elected to become an armed robber. The book gives a fairly accurate chronological description of his subsequent activities which, in addition to relieving various banks and businesses of their ready cash, also includes a horrific catalogue of excessive violence and half a life detained at Her Majesty's pleasure.

The first factor that sets this book apart is that there is no ghost writer; the experiences here are genuinely being described first hand . The second is that, although it does adopt the usual infatuation with the kudos of being a hard man and the supposed criminal code of honour, this is taken less and less as a given as Smith's career progresses. It's safe enough to say that few other books of this type are honest enough to draw out the difference in attitude between welcoming a heavy prison sentence with jokes and laughter whilst sitting with the other hard men in the reception block and dissolving into tears when left alone as the door to the solitary cell closes. The third, and possibly most important factor is that Smith, although habitually treated by the prison system as borderline illiterate, writes with a style and passion that belies the nature of the book. For good or ill, he really can write.

For the reader approaching the subject matter with an open mind, it is at once both the absurdity to the background of many of the crimes and the essentially facile reasons for carrying them out that hits home. Thus, Smith's first foray into his chosen specialist crime yields £20 cash and eight copies of the Bay City Rollers' Greatest Hits and he carries out his second totally ignorant of the fact that he has the safety catch engaged on the shotgun. More ludicrous still is that fact that, informed of his error, he subsequently manages to deafen and nearly kill the gang members by taking off the catch, discharging the weapon within a confined space and blowing the roof off the getaway car. In a later episode Smith and an associate spend a day drinking and taking drugs before heading off to murder a rival and are so wasted that very nearly manage to shoot each other and provide their adversary with such an effective advanced announcement of their presence and intentions that they only manage to escape by staggering away wounded themselves. In short, we seem to be looking at a rare beast for this kind of book; the unvarnished truth.

Arrest and imprisonment follow as inevitable consequences and Smith writes with fervour and no little venom of his experiences of the prison system. "Porridge" this isn't and if half of what he says is true, the levels of both casual and extreme violence in prisons during the seventies and eighties were truly horrendous, as was the brutalising effect on both inmates and prison officers. In this respect, Smith takes some credit for securing subsequent improvements as a tireless campaigner for prisoners' rights. As elsewhere, the quality of the writing and research lend significant support to the author's case, not least in the fact that he has taken the trouble to work through his own prison records, helpfully now available through freedom of information legislation.

Although the book is worth reading in itself, the true fascination lies in Smith's privileged position in being able to answer the question as to why he, and others like him, made this particular career choice. Almost inevitably, no definitive answer is provided; rather, the strands of the truth are woven through the text. Although there is some attempt to suggest that social factors had an influence, and in particular police discrimination in his youth, it comes through clearly that the main reasons at first were that crime gave him a buzz and it paid well. However, when Smith looks back on his life critically, which he does with an honesty that at times aspires to painfulness and elicits as much empathy as can be evoked for such a violent character, the answer is much less clear and hints strongly at a feeling of waste for lost opportunities that may in truth never have been.

This is in many ways a remarkable book written by a remarkable character, worthy of a significant measure of respect for his writing abilities. That said, the picture presented means that when he does get released I, for one, would sadly be unlikely to risk having a drink with him.

Fear and Loathing in S.W.2
Having left South West London twenty five years ago I have, like most of us, wondered what the kids I grew up with are doing now. Up until around `81' I would go back to visit every couple of weeks and the conversation would invariably turn to "Who's in jail?" "Who just got out?" Eventually the question would become "Who's dead?" "Who's alive?"

I remember one of my best friends Noel showing me a paper clipping from the South London Press reporting on his failed stick up of an off-license in Balham. By 1980 that was the way the wind was blowing. As kids we were always involved in some life threatening escapade or another, but it was more for kicks and only occasionally criminal. But by the time half my friends were in remand centres or borstals I knew I was well out of it.

So although it came as a massive surprise, it really shouldn't have, when I recently discovered that the aforementioned Noel is now better known as Razor Smith and is currently serving life for armed robbery.

Smith has shot, slashed and robbed his way into gangland legend. Before his life sentence he was the frightener in a gang of four known as the `Laughing Bank Robbers' who carried out a string of bank raids around South London, he has fifty eight criminal convictions to his name and has now chosen to write his autobiography - "A Few Kind Words and a Loaded Gun."

Described by G.Q magazine as "One of the most powerful and intelligent crime memoirs we've ever read" and "extraordinary" by the Guardian, I just thought it plain surreal to be standing in the middle of Waterstones seeing my name included in the `lavishly blood splattered' memoirs of a major career criminal. Names, places, incidents, half forgotten friends and enemies and even my brother all contextualised in the pre-teen remembrances of a kid I took my first and only pinch with. (For messing around on a railway track - ironically) And although Smith is no killer and I'm certainly no choirboy - I felt like Pat O'Briens's priest from the movie `Angels With Dirty Faces' reading about the gangster exploits of his boyhood chum Rocky Sullivan played by James Cagney. In fact we were all Cagney fanatics in those days, endlessly acting out scenes from White Heat or Public Enemy on the roof tops of Streatham High Road.

The book goes on to outline various `tear ups' between all those old sub-cultures of the late 70's such as the Rockabilly's, Skinheads, Punks, Smoothies and Teds which culminated in, perhaps, some of the most notorious pre-gun gang wars such as `The Battle of Morden,' `The White Swan Massacre,' and the seemingly fortnightly riots at the Chickaboom Club in Carlshalton. But by the time most of these incidents took place I was lost in music and Razor had gone the way of the gun.

As I say, we all wonder about what happened to the kids we grew up with. I just never thought I'd find out in such a spectacular fashion.

Noel `Razor' Smith is currently residing in HMP Grendon.

Thought Provoking
This isn't my normal kind of book, I was pointed towards it by someone who wanted me to know all about it, in a good way!

When I picked it up I felt I would struggle, after all, im normally seen reading little paperbacks and this is a hulking thick hardback that didn't fit on the bookcase. But im very glad I was pointed towards it.

I found this book insightful, looking at the world around that's real for a change, instead of the fiction im normally reading. It comes from a different angle to that which almost everyone will be able to see with authority, and it does this with an ease and an eloquence that surprises given the statements from some of the prison officers that Razor is below average intelligence.

Each and every event is described with accuracy and structure that is easily followed, and very often includes an explanation at the end of the state of mind Razor was in at the time. Most people would use this as a justification for their actions, but I felt that there was a struggle going on to ensure this was most certainly not the way it should be taken. Not an excuse, just an explanation, there's a difference.

It would be interesting to read the books of the other prisoners who have written about themselves who are mentioned in this one, to seek out any common references and try and piece times together. I would also be interested to read about what the prison officers might write about Razor, should they ever publish a book. I get the impression that some of those officers would be diametrically opposed in their opinions. For example, the two governors of the same jail, one fully supportive of Razor and the following one completely the opposite.

I learnt something, and I think most people would too. Something that can only come from having been in the places, the situations and the lives of people like Razor. I will say im glad to not have been there, it wouldn't have been the life for me, im one of the guys who trudges off, follows the system and does as they are told. But having said that, I know what that adrenaline rush is like, I know what a buzz is like and I feel the need to get them. I get mine from a different source, but had I been born in the same place, treated to the same experiences in childhood and at the hands of the police, I might be next door now.

I noticed as the book progresses that there were periods of good and periods of bad times. I wonder now if, had a few more of those good ones been joined together, or a little support been given at the right time, when Razor was feeling remorse for missing being in his kids lives, things could have changed.

That support not being there is probably a lot of different peoples faults, Razor seems to admit one of them is him, but the book leaves you with a very clear understanding that two of the others are the prison system, including those who run it and also (possibly just in my opinion) general society for not looking where they could.

Im told there is another book on its way, possibly looking a little more at the gang life. I will read it!