On the Run
From AwardAnnals
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| Author(s) | Gregg Hill, Gina Hill |
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| Subtitle | A Mafia Childhood |
| Publisher | Warner Books |
| Honors | |
| In the 1970s, Henry Hill pulled off heists and busted heads with the Mob. In the ‘80s, he became famous-as the antihero of the bestselling book Wiseguy and blockbuster movie Goodfellas. But there was one story he couldn’t tell. Now his children, Gregg and Gina, tell it for him. On the Run is the extraordinary true account of what it’s like to grow up in the federal witness protection program. Just as Gregg was celebrating his bar mitzvah and his sister, Gina, was buying her first bra, Henry Hill was informing on his former cronies. Henry, his wife, and… | |
In the 1970s, Henry Hill pulled off heists and busted heads with the Mob. In the ‘80s, he became famous-as the antihero of the bestselling book Wiseguy and blockbuster movie Goodfellas. But there was one story he couldn’t tell. Now his children, Gregg and Gina, tell it for him.
On the Run is the extraordinary true account of what it’s like to grow up in the federal witness protection program. Just as Gregg was celebrating his bar mitzvah and his sister, Gina, was buying her first bra, Henry Hill was informing on his former cronies. Henry, his wife, and children were swept into protective custody. And Gregg and Gina, who’d already been exposed to their father’s wild side, were about to be ripped from their home and lose the only normalcy they’d ever known.
Taking only what they could fit in a bag, the Hill children began a nightmarish life on the run: constantly moving from town to town, often without warning, and always knowing that their Uncle Jimmy, along with their father’s other former “friends,” wanted the Hills dead. All the while, Henry, a violent career criminal with a taste for hard drugs and women, used his new identity to break the law and make new enemies-forcing the family to run again and again. For Gina, the journey from Queens to Nebraska to Kentucky to Washington State was one of fierce denial-of trying to see the best in her abusive father, of learning her skills as an amateur actress, and finally uttering the unspeakable truth to her best friend. For Gregg, it was a chronicle of heartache, sacrifice, and violence: giving up a tennis career, standing up his first date because the family had to flee that night, and finally, after a series of near lethal confrontations with his father, running for his life.
Exploding the myths of glitz and camaraderie that surround the Mob, On the Run is a gritty, heartbreaking true story of children born into two families at once: the loud, violent Hills, and the silent, murderous Mafia. In their own eloquent words, Gregg and Gina Hill tell how they survived both-and finally got the best revenge.
Honors
Reviews
Barnes and Noble
Gregg and Gina Hill are the son and daughter of former Mafia bad guy Henry Hill, the subject of Nicholas Pileggi’s 1987 bestseller Wiseguy and Martin Scorsese’s film Goodfellas. Gregg and Gina grew up in the Witness Protection Program, moving from place to place and changing identities as their parents sought normalcy and safety. Being hunted by professional hit men was not their only problem. Their own father, unrepentant and sometimes violent, continued his scamming activities, endangering the entire family. On the Run is a memoir unlike any other.
