Hard Time by Shaun Attwood: Book Review

Time for the review of the second book from June’s reading list, Hard Time by Shaun Attwood. Hard Time is another jail memoir, I have a bit of an obsession with these types of books. This one is billed as “A Brit in America’s Toughest Jail”.

Hard Time by Shaun Attwood: My Review

Blurb from The Back Cover

Using a golf pencil sharpened on a cell wall, Shaun Attwood wrote one of the first prison blogs, “Jon’s Jail Journal”, excerpts of which where published in The Guardian and attracted international media attention.

Brought up in England, Shaun took his business degree to Phoenix, Arizona, where he became an award winning stock broker and then a millionaire day trader during the dot com bubble. But Shaun was leading a double life. A fan of the early rave scene in Manchester, he formed a organisation that threw raves and distributed class A drugs. Before being convicted of money laundering and drug dealing, her served 26 months in the infamous Arizona jail system run by the notorious Sheriff Joe Arpaio.

Hard Time is the harrowing yet often darkly humorous account of the time Shaun spent submerged in a nightmarish world of gang violence, insect-infested cells and food unfit for human consumption. His remarkable story provides a revealing glimpse into the tragedy, brutality, comedy and eccentricity of prison life.

My Thoughts on The Book

Hard Times is kind of brutal. Some of what the prisoners go through is beyond belief, especially when it’s happening in America, rather than some third world country. Somehow, that makes it seem worse.

I’m a believer in the school of thought that most prisoners are volunteers – ie, they did the crime knowing the consequences. Where I think this one is particularly brutal, is that Shaun was throwing raves and handing out Es. While this isn’t something that would go unpunished, it’s not like he was raping and killing people, which I think makes the way he was treated even worse.

Conclusion and Rating

Overall, Hard Times wasn’t a bad read, it told the story well in a way that made me want to keep reading it. However, the fact that this book was planned before Shaun got released does make me wonder if it’s a bit exaggerated. Either way, it’s an entertaining book that made me cringe in places. 3/5

To view and buy on Amazon, click here.

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