Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Book Title Needed

My publisher and parents feel the title of my jail memoir, Green Baloney and Pink Boxers, is too difficult to understand. So now the book needs a new title. My suggestion is Surviving Sheriff Joe's Jail. If you have a better title, something so brilliant that me and my publisher and parents won't be able to resist it, please post it in the comments section below. If it's used, you'll be getting a free signed copy.

Here's the blurb to help you put your book-title thinking caps on:

This book is an account of the 26 months Shaun Attwood spent in the jail system run by the infamous Sheriff Joe Arpaio in Phoenix, Arizona. It begins with a SWAT team knocking Shaun’s door down, and his arrest for heading an organisation that threw raves and distributed club drugs. Initially, Shaun goes into shock as he’s submerged into a nightmarish world of gang violence, insect-infested cells and food unfit for animals. But with the love and support of his family and fiancĂ©e, Claudia, he slowly adapts. Other prisoners Shaun meets on his journey tell their stories. His large and fearless friend since childhood, Wild Man, pops up all over the place with his unique brand of chaos. Shaun’s situation devastates his loved ones, and his mother has a nervous breakdown. The prosecutor and Detective Reid are out to get Shaun a life sentence, and the legal developments cause many emotional ups and downs. Over time, Shaun tries to avoid getting smashed by forming various alliances, including with the Italian Mafia and the independent tough guy, Joe. Shaun increasingly uses jail time for learning and introspection. He takes up yoga, and ponders the big questions in philosophy. The letters he writes home, which make his family both laugh and cry, tell such a graphic tale that his parents encourage him to write more in order to document his incarceration. Towards the end of his stay and with the help of his family, he starts the blog, Jon’s Jail Journal, to expose the conditions and human rights violations. The book ends with his family flying over from England for a sentencing hearing that has everyone on the verge of mental collapse.

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Shaun P. Attwood

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