First Blood
by
Book Cover & Preview Text
Statistics tell us that 12.9 million US Families are headed by a single parent, 80% of which are female who are at high risk of losing, or have already lost their child to the streets. First Blood features a single, working mother of nine forced to manage while saddled with trying to raise a street thug. First Blood sends a controversial question...what can be done? YOU DECIDE.
Here's and excerpt from my book and some of what the critics are saying.
“This is a stickup!” yelled Neon. His face was covered with his red bandana as he wielded his gun. The other Bloods stood in a big circle facing him.
Neon pointed the gun at them and shouted. “Face down! Get face down on the ground! Put your hands out in front so I can see ‘em! If anybody moves they’re dead!”
Rap, who was standing off to the side, turned and faced the Bloods. “Now, you start going through and emptying out their pockets one at a time,” he explained.
“What if they move?” asked one of the Bloods in the robbery training class.
Neon took off his mask and turned around. “If anybody moves, I shoot.” He handed the gun to a Blood in the group behind him. “You Bloods practice till you get it right, now go again,” said Neon.
_________
"The novel’s chief virtue is it is vigorous and pungent, though stereotyped, portrait of ghetto life, stocked with sassy hookers, smooth pimps, menacing thugs and hapless wannabe hoodlums—and lots of earnest strivers wondering where their kids went wrong".
"A crude but lively morality play".
-Kirkus Discoveries
"FIRST BLOOD exposes deficiencies we must all address if we are to direct our children toward a better life. It is an extremely powerful and candid account of society’s regrettable, but authentic side we all hear about on the nightly news".
-Felix Aguirre Author of: A Parent’s Guide to Street Gangs and Street Gangs and Law Enforcement. Retired San Diego Police Detective and Consultant on Criminal Street Gang culture, dynamics and other issues.
"Gang violence, once considered just a city phenomenon, is quickly spreading to America's small towns, rural areas and correctional facilities. It's becoming a problem for all of us. FIRST BLOOD offers a dramatic and realistic fictionalized account of the origins of the first urban gangs and explores the factors, as real today as they were then, that led to the formation of this increasingly dangerous segment of our society. A must read for police officers, parents and educators".
-Marilyn Olsen President Public Safety Writers Association
"Words painting vivid pictures of America's urban adolescence caught up in drugs and hatred. Taking the fork one way lands a youth in prison, another ends up on a cold steel table at the Coroner’s Office. Neon, leader of the "BLOODS" leads a fast paced life of crime. FIRST BLOOD by Johnny Russell jolts the reader into the truth about the vulnerability of today’s youth in America”.
-J. D. Michael Phelps, author The Execution of Justice
“Johnny Russell brought a thought-provoking tale with FIRST BLOOD. Russell shows how disastrous it can be when the dynamic of the African-American family unit is disrupted. Although Neon's mother tried to do her best to keep him and his brothers off the streets, she clearly needed Neon's father to step up to the plate. Russell also did a good job of showing the formation of the Bloods and the Crips. It illustrates how street gangs are still a deadly problem in our society”.
-Radiah Hubbert for Urban Reviews
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About the Book
In the novel First Blood, one family is caught up in the never-ending cycle of gang violence after seeking a fresh start in Los Angeles, California.
Ever since he was a small boy in Texas, Rodney “Neon” Robinson always called the shots. But when his newly-single mother moves him and his six siblings to southern California, their new life introduces them to more than a new urban existence. Thirteen-year-old troubled Neon falls victim to the streets and becomes incarcerated, spending the better portion of his adolescent life inside the Los Angeles criminal justice system where he discovers the beginnings of a new family—the Bloods. Neon manages to slip under the radar of law enforcement while slowly building a loyal following, beginning with his cellmate. When he finally emerges from prison, Neon spawns one of the gravest epidemics of modern life: the curse of modern gang violence.
As the Bloods and the Crips begin a vicious rivalry like no other, another heartbreaking story is taking place behind the scenes as Neon’s family suffers the devastating results that come from a young man’s choices in a city that shows no mercy.
See the book trailer here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYtHLFjoesc
About the Author
As a youth Johnny Russell grew up with brothers who were street gang leaders. As an adult he became a police officer and had a thirty-year career. During his career he gained extensive knowledge by working with street gangs and has seen their destructive effect on American society. Russell has always felt a need to address the effect of America's street gangs, and writes from a coming of age, younger sibling’s perspective. FIRST BLOOD is his debut novel.
More about the author here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYtHLFjoesc