Luellen Smiley is a creative nonfiction writer, author, columnist, and historian whose writing is deeply rooted in a controversial personal history. She is the daughter of Allen Smiley, a close friend, associate, and business partner of notorious Las Vegas gangster Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel. Her father was sitting only feet from Siegel when Siegel was murdered in Beverly Hills on June 20, 1947.
That extraordinary childhood history became the foundation for Smiley’s first book, Cradle of Crime: A Daughter’s Tribute, published in 2017. The memoir explores what it was like to grow up as the daughter of a man connected to organized crime while trying to reconcile her love for her father with the secrecy, fear, and criminal world surrounding him.
Smiley’s work has appeared in publications including the New York Post, MORE Magazine, Southern California newspapers, and Authorlink. She wrote the newspaper column Smiley’s Dice—Adventures in Livingness, which earned a Blue-Ribbon Award from the California Newspapers Association for her Growing Up With Gangsters columns.
Her interest in her father’s history also led her to become a researcher and commentator on organized crime history. She has participated in television, radio, and documentary interviews.
Smiley’s next book, Gaslighting Greta, will be published this year. A personal story that reads like fiction. Her own website describes the project as exploring a woman whose life is destabilized by gaslighting and psychological manipulation.
Her writing career reflects a recurring theme: using personal experience and research to uncover the truth behind complicated relationships and extraordinary lives. From the secretive world surrounding her father and Bugsy Siegel to the deeply personal territory of Gaslighting Greta, Smiley’s work transforms difficult experiences into stories of survival, discovery, and ultimately reclaiming one’s voice.
Luellen Smiley is an author whose life has given her an unusual perspective on secrecy, manipulation, family loyalty, betrayal, and survival—and she uses that perspective as the raw material for her nonfiction storytelling.
A LOT OF I HAVE THIS AND I HAVE THAT. I’M GOING THERE, AND I KNOW THIS.
AND I JUST LISTENED. A CONVERSATION THAT MOVED AT
OLYMPIC SPEED WITHOUT ANY REVERENCE.
IT WASN’T MY GENERATION. I UNFURNISHED MY LIFE. FIRST I GAVE AWAY THE UNWORN, THE UNUSED, UNWANTED, THE
BROKEN, AND UNREPAIRABLE, ANTIQUES, AND PC PROGRAMS,
STEREOS, TABLES, CHAIRS AND CLOCKS.THEN IT WAS MY DRESSING ROOM COLLECTION: JEANS AND JACKETS, SUNGLASSES, AND SHOES, PURSES AND GLOVES, BELTS AND HATS. I DON’T WANT TO SEE WHO I WAS; I WANT TO SEE WHO I AM NOW.
I LOVE TO GIVEAWAY – TO LOSE WEIGHT =I LOVE TO SEE THE SMILES WHEN I OFFER A GIFT.
I rarely comment, but after browsing a few of the remarks here THE GIFT OF GIVING | SMILEY’S DICE.
I actually do have a couple of questions for you if it’s okay.
Is it simply me or does it give the impression like some of these remarks appear like they are written by brain dead folks?
😛 And, if you are writing on additional sites, I would like to
follow you. Could you post a list of all of all your shared pages like your Facebook
page, twitter feed, or linkedin profile?
I LOVE TO SEE THE SMILES WHEN I OFFER A GIFT.
5 responses to “THE GIFT OF GIVING”
I rarely comment, but after browsing a few of the remarks here THE GIFT OF GIVING | SMILEY’S DICE.
I actually do have a couple of questions for you if it’s okay.
Is it simply me or does it give the impression like some of these remarks appear like they are written by brain dead folks?
😛 And, if you are writing on additional sites, I would like to
follow you. Could you post a list of all of all your shared pages like your Facebook
page, twitter feed, or linkedin profile?
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Reblogged this on SMILEY'S DICE and commented:
this is a test to see if the format is working
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thanks, I am sure you know how to unfurnish better than I do.
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Nice – you are motivating me to unfurnish my life (great term) too. Thanks for the inspiration again! WZ
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Simply a beautiful Post…..I loved it.
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