Author: Jim Quillen
Publisher: Century
Publication Date: 15th January 2015
Pages: 384
Source: Review Copy
Rating: 5/5
Purchase: Amazon
It was 1942, and twenty-two-year-old Jim Quillen was on the run from San Quentin prison, where he'd been serving eighteen months for armed robbery. He thought he'd made a lucky escape - until he was caught and sentenced to forty-five years in the federal prison system, including ten years at the infamous Alcatraz.
Inside Alcatraz tells the story of the brutality and extreme regimentation that were a part of the daily life for the inmates of the island prison. They nicknamed it 'Hellcatraz', and Jim was about to find out why. He lived though it all, from solitary confinement and cramped, lonely cells to meeting Bob 'the Birdman' Stroud, and surviving the forty-six-hour bloody riot known as the Battle of Alcatraz.
In this moving memoir, Jim reflects on the ten hard years he spent on the island. He tells us of the hardships he suffered and the friendships he made on his long journey from desperation to redemption.