#7 Books for mothers with sons in prison

Prison Books

Today I was checking some of my blogs and saw there was a search for prison books for mothers with a son in prison. I wanted to take a little time to talk about that today, since I blogged very early this morning (if you count midnight as early)

There is no doubt that there are indeed books out there for mothers looking for something to read on this genre. I don’t suppose many will be too mainstream, as the very idea of people in prison is not desirable for “perfect citizens”.

And personally I have a few issues with prison books in the availability, and even motive for writers. Now to be sure there are some good prison books out there, so don’t feel like you can’t find any, a good search will uncover some good places that sell prison books.

But when you look for that, who’s perspective are you looking for? Are you looking for a prison book written by a mother who had to endure her son going to prison, or are you looking for a book written by an ex felon who knows what it is like to do time? The perspective you are looking for will have a dramatic impact of what you intend to get out of it.

I honestly don’t know the ratio of books written by ex felons, or mothers with sons in prison, or wives with husbands in prison, or so called “prison experts”. I really don’t know. But there are things that need to be mentioned about it.

If you are a seasoned reader of my blogs, since I have been blogging for over 7 years, you know I myself have written a prison book. It is called “Grades of Honor” and no, you won’t find it in any book store. That is because I self publish my works and I don’t have any book deals with Amazon or Books A Million.

I wrote my book from my computer, using my experience of what I went through, and on request I print my books out and mail them to whomever wants to buy one. I always add free stuff with it, like prison cards, a prison encouragement certificate and things like that. All that is basic stuff because I can’t afford to shop around and hope somebody likes my story. Right now I can’t print my works because I really need a new computer, as this one is starting to break down. So I am looking to try to earn some money to buy a new computer so I can get back to my printing works on prison issues.

But having said that, I do have a book. The difficulty with that is that many prison support sites often talk about prison books, which is giving them a free plug, but often times if I even mention that I have a prison book, I got warned or even banned for supposedly “self promotion”.

I find that insultingly moronic, because these sites will give free promotion of a book, who’s author never made one post or comment on that prison support site, let alone even know if such a site exists, but they get the benefit of the doubt and the free promotion. Yet I have contributed hundreds of post, answered tons of email, but I can’t even say the name of the book I am writing because now I am some con artist trying to scam people out of their money.

I have read many posts on many prison support sites and sit here thinking, “how hypocritical is that?” People that don’t contribute to those sites get the publicity without even knowing it, but the ones that are “in the trenches” with the site can’t get the time of day.

And I guess to me that is a problem on both ends. If a person writes a prison book, it would seem that they would take the time to go check out some of those prison sites, to lend a helping hand. If they have so much expertise to write a book, why can’t they help a few people going through a tough time? It’s not like they have to write 1000 posts, but at least show that you care enough to help a little.

That’s not a knock on anyone who has a prison book, because I don’t know all the circumstances in their situation, but in my years of writing, I have almost never run across a person who contributes to a site and has a book out. Again, that does not mean it does not exist, I just have not seen it.

I would really love to be able to write my 3rd or 4th book, the “Grades of Honor” has been a pleasure to write, especially when people who bought my book told me how much it helped them. I don’t suppose it will ever be on the best sellers list, but I had hoped it could at least stimulate an income. Maybe it will again soon. In fact, it is part of the reason I restarted my blog, to try to create an income by my prison books, or cards or other things I want to provide.

So anyway, there are prison books out there, although I would hope that readers would ask me about mine. But at this moment, I can’t print out any just yet, have to get a few more resources together. But if you are interested at least in what my book is about, let me know, I will be more than happy to tell you about it.

Anyway, hope that helps a bit.