Order from a Major Online Bookstore
Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine
Save Your Time And Money
| AnyBook4Less.com | Order from a Major Online Bookstore |
|
| Home | Store List | FAQ | Contact Us | | ||
| Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine Save Your Time And Money |
||
 |
Title: You Got Nothing Coming : Notes From a Prison Fish by Jimmy A. Lerner ISBN: 0-7679-0919-4 Publisher: Broadway Pub. Date: 14 October, 2003 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.44 (121 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: How to make god laugh? Tell him your plans...
Comment: As a certified S.O.B (Seriously Obsessive Bibliophile), i have to say that this one qualifies with flying colors as a major "cantputdowner".
Jail? Doin' time? There's a big selection of books out there about this dark issue. Many of them very good. "You got nothing coming" beats them all in my humble opinion, not because:
-its story is original
-you'll read anything in here you havent heard, read, or seen in movies about the prison system before
but for reasons unpredicted when picking up a book about incarceration, such as:
-its beyond top-level humor and sarcasm
-its mix of corporate training and jail code to survive
But more to the specifics. Reading a book written by a former (or current) convict is usually a bitter, heartbreaking experience. It's bound to be. Being in prison doesnt normally inspire the most optimistic feelings on behalf of the author if you know what I mean.
Jimmy Lerner (the author), up until the moment of landing in a hardcore Nevada prison, is a constantly recovering alcoholic, part time prescription drug addict, hard trying loving father, formerly married, hard working (professionally "succesful") corporate man who is about to even make it to the big time.
All this becomes a not so distant blur of the past as his precariously balanced life takes a turn for the worst, when he winds up strangling a drug dealer in -more than obvious- self defense.
Perhaps predictably, the system isnt too impressed with his crudentials and he lands a sentence of 2 to 12 years.
As if that wasnt going to be enough of a shock, his very first cellmate is a heavy-framed nazi skinhead who also happens to be a major play-caller in the prison. All around him, the environs dont look much better as the "population" is made up of all kinds of gangs with an ominous set of issues. And he - the author- is the "fish" who along with the rest of the convicts "has nothin' comin'". Clueless, at first, to the realities, the bizzare code, the surreal "morals" and everyday horrors of life in prison, as well as the the impending threat to one's bodily safety if not overall existence, the "fish" begins an upward struggle to survive using...psychology techniques he learned in the corporate seminars he'd attended (where he was paying attention as he admits).
Does it work? Most of the time it shockingly does allthough he seems to be "lucky" in his misfortune as more than once he has uncomfortably close brushes with seriously unpleasant experiences (such as being stabbed in broad daylight in the "yard", or, coming close to being run over by a 250 pound con who feels he's been "disrespected"). Oh, and all that, without his nazi skinhead cellmate having discovered that J.Lerner is a ...Jew.
Written in hilarious style, with incredible (considering the circumstances) humor and wit, "You got nothing coming" shouldnt be regarded as just another prison story novel, but rather, as one of the most powerful true-story novels to have come out in recent memory.
Indeed, I couldnt point to another book that has the ability to keep you contineously suspended between terror and laughter. That would be because it would take incredible talent from the part of the author. Lerner not only possesses that talent but he does so in abundance.
At the same time, Lerner emerges as a powerful human being. Not in the muscle sense most of his inmates are but inside. He deals with a situation, which, considering the circumstances, would lead other men (or women) to their ultimate downfall, with intelligence, mental but mostly emotional.
It's not exactly simple to feel like you're dealing with a crowd of psychos (or soon to be psychos), may they be inmates or guards, while you are their sole "therapist". Lerner might not sense it that way, but thats what he ultimately does: he functions as a psychologist treating simoultaneously 300 patients.
Miraculously (for his own sake) it seems to work.
I read "You got nothing coming" in a period of little of 2 days (over 360 pages of it) simply because once i started it i found it to be so gripping and compelling i couldnt bring myself to put it down. Funny as hell and more hellish than hell, dark enough to put the lights out in your most illuminated optimisms, threatening in an omnipresent way and bitter the way only prison books can be, this book is nothing less than a msterpiece in its own right.
One of the most impacting books I've ever layed my eyes on.
Rating: 5
Summary: Monster or Midget? Who Cares - A Fantastic Book!!!!
Comment: So The New York Times thinks it newsworthy that the author, Jimmy Lerner, changed some incidents and descriptions to tell a great story. And this is a fascinating and beautifully written book. We know this much is true: The author was just an average middle-class corporate drone who spent 3 years in a Nevada prison trying to get along with skinheads, his Nazi cellmate, black, Mexican and white supremacist gangs and at the same time trying to get his laundry done by paying tobacco and stamps for the service!!!
The humor throughout the book is a continual surprise and delight and the author's ear for convict speech is pitch-perfect.
The author is open and painfully honest about his lifelong struggle with drugs and alcohol. He does not try to portray himself as model citizen but rather as a flawed human being with his share of personal problems - in other words, like the rest of us.
I urge anyone who is looking for a great read, an unforgettable story, to buy this book!!
Rating: 2
Summary: Don't Let a Murderer Profit
Comment: The author killed a man ("self defense' with a belt and a plastic bag. Uh-huh) and now profits from this book while the victim's family wakes up every day without him. By all means, read this book at the library, buy it used, or borrow it from a friend, but do NOT purchase it new.
 |
Title: Behind Bars: Surviving Prison by Jeffrey Ian Ross, Stephen C. Richards ISBN: 0028643518 Publisher: Alpha Books Pub. Date: 07 May, 2002 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
 |
Title: The Hot House : Life Inside Leavenworth Prison by Pete Earley ISBN: 0553560239 Publisher: Bantam Pub. Date: 01 February, 1993 List Price(USD): $7.50 |
 |
Title: Newjack : Guarding Sing Sing by Ted Conover ISBN: 0375726624 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 12 June, 2001 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
 |
Title: Life in Prison by Stanley "Tookie" Williams, Barbara Cottman Becnel ISBN: 1587170949 Publisher: SeaStar Books Pub. Date: February, 2001 List Price(USD): $5.95 |
 |
Title: Inside Rikers : Stories from the World's Largest Penal Colony by Jennifer Wynn ISBN: 0312261799 Publisher: St. Martin's Press Pub. Date: 25 July, 2001 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
Thank you for visiting www.AnyBook4Less.com and enjoy your savings!
Copyright� 2001-2021 Send your comments
