Product Description

He's taken more hostages inside of prison than any UK prisoner. He holds awards for his art and writing. He's had more prison rooftop protests than anyone alive or dead. He's the UK's most feared yet most misunderstood prisoner. In Bronson's own words, find out what makes him tick and explode.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #649602 in Books
• Published on: 2003-07-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 214 pages

Prisons Newspaper ‘Inside Time’ September ,1998
“A mind blowing experience.”

From the Publisher
The co-author helped LWT make a documentary about Bronson as well as taking part in a documentary screened on the digital Choices channel later screened on C5 in October 2001, Mirage Publishing with Stephen Richards made a three hour video documentary and the film script has been written for the big screen movie and more is yet to come!

Excerpted from Silent Scream - the Charles Bronson Story by Charles Bronson, Stephen Richards, Dave Courtney. Copyright © 1999. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
I wasn’t one of those kids that took pleasure in cutting up little pets or causing any animal harm for that matter. I’ve got to say it because those psychologist people are always on about the correlation between serial killers and people of violence having a sort of liking for starting out by causing pain to animals and then building up to bigger things, like people. The first bit of pain I caused anyone was to my dear old mum, Eira Peterson, and that was only because I was being born at the time. I’m a Luton lad born and bred. If I’d hung on a bit longer it would have been Christmas when I came into this mad world, but like anything else time waits for no one and I arrived on the sixth day of December 1952 at 56 Longcroft Road, Luton. My good old dad, John Gordon Peterson, (known as Joe) worked in a coach works as a coach painter way back then and he knocked out quality work; ‘quality’ then was something to stand by and be proud of. I always looked up to my old man and just like dad my middle name was Gordon, so there I am, Michael Gordon Peterson.

It seemed I didn’t have much luck with schools because as far as I can recall I was kicked out of most of the schools I went to. Maybe if I told you that my nickname was ‘Crusher’ then it might give you an idea why I was expelled so much. I used to get a hold of the teachers and squeeze them in a friendly bear hug, but I don’t think I really knew my own strength. I was always a physical person and didn’t let anyone take liberties with me, although some tried. I remember my first taste of being on the wrong end of violence was when a teacher gave me something that was commonly called ‘six of the best’. It left welts on my body did this six of the best; this didn’t take long to arouse my anger. I gave him a bunch of fives in return and knocked him clean out, he deserved it for being a pervo and it’s something that still comes to haunt me even to this day. Other kids would have forgotten the hidings they had taken at school and how some teachers would throw the blackboard duster smack bang straight into the middle of your head, simply because it was so long ago – not me though. For me, every time I get into a scrap with prison warders, it all comes rushing back. I admit that I do have a good memory and no matter what it takes I’ll get my own back. I’ve waited for years just to get the last laugh, but not over silly things as if that was the case I just wouldn’t get to have peace.

‘Don’t let the buggers get you down’ was an inscription on some big knob’s watch given to him by an MP pal. I should have had that tattooed into my forehead so I could see it whenever I get the rare opportunity to look into a mirror. Because every time ‘they’ get me down, they start to jump all over me, like what happened at the Scrubs (Wormwood Scrubs prison), more about that later though. It’s during that type of one sided confrontation when they outnumber me by ten to one and all of them are tooled up that I recall that teacher laying into me with that leather strap. It’s that what gives me the fight to go on, because they are all bullies and all bullies should be chinned good and proper, but bullies’ minds don’t work like normal people’s, they know how to keep themselves out of harms way; ‘cut and run’ is their way.

Icknield High at Riddy Lane in Luton was the first school I got kicked out of and then Challney High School for Boys, it just went on and on, it wasn’t that I wanted it to be that way, ‘cos I was always one for searching out answers. My bedroom walls were covered in Dracula, Frankenstein and Rocky Marciano posters. No different to kids nowadays having posters of ‘Pulp Fiction’ or ‘Reservoir Dogs’ up on their walls along with the ‘Spice Girls’ and ‘Mike Tyson’. My hobbies were very limited, there weren’t such things as ‘Nintendo’ or ‘Game Boy’ computer games around then; it was either a skipping rope or a hoopla hoop, but them things weren’t for the likes of me. I preferred collecting spiders and shoplifting, but not necessarily in that order and that made up a typical lad in them days. Every kid goes through some sort of psychological change and scares the hell out of their parents; there’s nobody I know what can say that their childhood was all strawberries and cream. Some kids shake off their tags, mine’s just got that little bit bigger every time I’m in the news.

I was in the cubs and then progressed to the Boy Scouts, it was all the rage then and the fun of being by the campsite fire singing along with all the other boys made it seem as if though we were all special. Boys clubs were common and they led onto boxing clubs, where’ve they all gone, does anyone really care? You have the likes of these world champ boxers putting money into clubs to keep them going or opening a new one. These men know that if the kids aren’t kept off the streets then they’re likely to end up in trouble, because that’s the only choice they had, not many go on to become world champs.

Customer Reviews

Can't get it back from my mates
Trouble is my mates at work have had this book for some time now and I'm going to have to put my foot down so as to get it back. I wanted to put a review here because this is where I bought the book from. I beleive he is a unique and very special person and needs help. He's been abused, that's for sure, but he's come through it all and surely he should become some use to the system. I was amazed at how many prisons he'd been to and in spite all of that he still has a sense of humour. The fight with the dog showed how brutal life can be and yet underneath all of that I sensed a very sensitive man screaming to be heard.

Absorbing, revealing, fantastic and breathtaking
From start to finsih this book took me on a roller coaster of a breathtaking ride through the life of Charles Bronson. A story full of twists and turns too numerous to mention but what certainly is apparent is the way he has been handled over the years and in spite of this he can write such a book, he has my respect.

As crazy as it gets! The hard truth about Bronson
Well...you read the papers, visit the website, and then buy the book. In his own unpredictable style Charlie tells a gripping story of his progress through the cells, strongboxes and roofs of Britain's penal system! The expression "larger than life" must have been introduced with Charlie in mind.

This isn't a fast,comfortable or easy read at all. Don't buy it in an airport! Expect to be amazed at some of his exploits and shocked by the brutality, and to have it all launched at you in the same manner in which Charlie lives. Raw, unpredictable and at times baffling as the reader is bounced across time and locations. A book that needs the reader to share in the intensity with which Bronson writes.

It really is one of those books in which the author manages to project his personality on to the page, and that in itself should make it a must-buy for anyone with an interest in crime.