Bill mason jewel thief photos

The book is well organized and conceived. In other collaborations like this one, sometimes you can sense in the work that storyteller and editor are working at cross-purposes. Curbing my instinct to reach for my editorial red pen. Oh, that some fiction was as entertaining and well written as this! After his first major heist, Mason says, he could not resist trying for more; stealing gave him an "indescribable euphoria.

He was also often lucky, happening upon unlocked windows or doors. Lyons in the Chicago Sun-Times. Armand Hammer, chairman of Occidental Petroleum, Mason breaks into a neighboring apartment from the roof, inches across a rain-slickened 15th-floor ledge, hops onto the Hammers' balcony, and slides open the unlocked patio door. This last detail, to Mason's continued amazement, is a running theme throughout the book, which marvels at the common-sense lapses, security gaps, dumb luck, and "failures of imagination" that made the impossible hilariously easy for him.

The book continues with episodes of escalating stakes, from a botched gas-station job in his youth to a monster safe at a miniature-golf course to a multimillion-dollar score off a dozing widow. And by night, he charmed his way into the inner circles of high society and stole priceless jewels from socialites and celebrities. Arguably, Bill Mason was one of the greatest jewel thieves in American history.

In the new book, "Confessions of a Master Jewel Thief," he reveals the true story behind some of his greatest heists, and how he did it. I spent five years.

Bill mason jewel thief photos

I lost five years of my life because of this. So I paid some great penalties. I lost a very devoted wife. I became addicted to it.