A loner since his strict Seventh Day Adventist childhood, Mark Brandon Read grew into a streetfighter, standover man, gunman and underworld executioner. Although feared throughout the Australian crime world, Read admits to being a criminal failure because he has spent most of his adult life in jail. But he has become a notorious celebrity as his crime memories have topped bestseller lists. Now self-styled writer in residence at Tasmania's Risdon Prison, he has completed his third volume of memoirs. This is it.