First published 2014
Willie Sutton packs his books and clears out his cell. Christmas 1969 in New York marks his release after seventeen years behind bars. A photographer and reporter accompany him through snow-covered streets as he traces the path of his notorious career. Sutton built his reputation on countless nonviolent bank robberies, but his thoughts return again and again to Bess, the woman he never forgot. Each stop on their journey reveals another piece of his story. The fragments of his life assemble like a puzzle, but the boundaries between truth and invention remain unclear. Sutton spent most of his time reading, attended movies every two weeks, went to theater twice a year, watched football games, and took long drives while smoking and studying the classics. His literary nature set him apart from other criminals in American history, making him a modern Robin Hood figure who captured the imagination of ordinary people from small backgrounds.
Genres: american-fiction, 20th-century, crime, biography-memoir
Vibes: atmospheric, emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: redemption, unreliable-narrator
Setting: New York
Period: 1969
433 pages · Paperback · Fischer