Criminals: My Family's Life on Both Sides of the Law

A prismatic provocative look at one familyled by a charismatic defense attorney fatherwhose bonds exist on both sides of the law The Siegels of New York are a singular creationquirky idealistic shaped in large part by Robert Anthony Siegels father a lovable impossible man of gargantuan appetites and sloppy ethics a criminal defense attorney who loved his drug-dealing clients a little too much and went to prison as a result. Siegels mother decided to pour her energies into making her children art-loving mavens of fine dining in international settingsall the things that his father was notwith Robert as her most targeted ally. Once out of prison Siegels father struggled with depression attempting to reenter legal practice with age and finances nipping at his heels. Robert as a son and later as an author attempts to put all of these pieces together to make a coherent shape of family before realizing that perhaps no such thing exists. Where is the thin permeable line between right and wrong? How does one family join the greater world of normal people beyond the demimonde of drug dealers bikers schemers rock musicians and artists that swirled around them? Criminals explores those questions without easy judgments creating a prism of an eccentric collection of characters bound together as the mysterious tribe of family.