Cage Stories: Memories of Fatherhood and Creation, is a book I wrote in 2000. As described on the back cover, “this collection of true stories portrays the life of the author as a series of confinements and escapes. From the coffin-like confessional in his childhood church, to his near burning in a Thanksgiving Day fire, to his escape from a Philadelphia police station, and to his more recent entanglement in the hostile world of lawyers and the law, the author has been trying to free himself from one thing or another for fifty years. In these stories, he tries to tell the truth about what happened in each case, and why it is that he’s always been free.”
THIS BOOK AIN’T TOO TERRIBLY BAD, BUT IT COMES WITH TWO WARNINGS:
- It may deserve an “R” rating. Back in 2001, I was selling copies of this book as part of a charity drive, donating all the proceeds to the United Way, when a complaint was made that the book was “immoral” and I was asked to stop selling it on that account. I was stunned to hear that someone considered the story of my life “immoral,” but I stopped selling it, as requested. (I’ve been hoping ever since that St. Peter doesn’t feel the same way about my life story.) To be fair, you should be aware that the book may not be suitable for a young audience. It is an attempt at an honest memoir, and in those portions dealing with the life of an adolescent boy and college student in the late 1960’s, there are passages that deal frankly with discoveries of — well — the sort of activities such boys are often interested in discovering. There isn’t a lot of that stuff in the book, so if you’re only interested in it because it’s “immoral,” you’d likely do better looking elsewhere…
- The book is a compilation of things written between age 16 and age 50. As such, it doesn’t represent my writing at its literary best. In addition to “immoral,” it has also been called “choppy” – but hey, it is what it is, it’s not all bad, and what do you expect? It’s free! (And, again to be fair, it also got a lot of very favorable reviews as well.)
If you’d like to download the .pdf file, and you’re willing to respect my copyright by agreeing to my terms and conditions, you can do so by clicking here:
Meanwhile, I still have a few bound copies (soft-cover, perfect bound 306 pages – ISBN 978-0-9768183-1-1). Send me an e-mail at admin@jwcarvin.com if you’re interested in adding one to your bookshelf.
