Final Destination

Towards the end of the book Parsell falls in love for the first time with this “boy”. His name is Paul. While reading I asked myself if Parsell became gay because of all the rape he had gone through did it really affect him?

I find it ironic how towards the end of the book he is separated from Paul because they fall in love. Why do they separate boyfriends and not gang member who sexually abuse other criminals, “You mean because we spend a lot of time together, but don’t get into trouble-that were a problem” Maybe this is where the problem comes in they don’t want to see anybody happy, for they enjoy seeing others suffering.

At the very end we can see how Parsell has been dramatically changed. He is a total different person and this experience in jail, really affected him in an optimistic way. In one of the last pages Parsell states, “I didn’t want to mess up again, like I had before.” Now he recognizes his mistake and shows he has learned from them, he doesn’t want to repeat it again. Also I was amazed when he said, “I thought about the old timers I met at Riverside, the ones who were doing life on the installment plan, and drinking paint thinner and Mountain Dew. I was not going to become one of them.” He has it clear he is much better than that, and I going to do whatever it takes to not fall into that world again.

This is a very interesting memoir at first I was bored reading it, but as I continued I realized it wasn’t the same old jail story. Parsell has a way of making it unique, by sharing every single experience he had to go through, you almost feel like you are living it. In some parts I even got goose bumps. Yet, Parsell did more than just writing this book I researched his biography and it’s quite interesting take a look…

“T.J. Parsell is a writer and human rights activist dedicated to ending sexual abuse against men, women, and children in all forms of detention. He is currently President-elect of Stop Prisoner Rape and serves as a consultant to the National Prison Rape Elimination Commission. Parsell has testified before numerous government bodies and was instrumental in passage of the Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003, the first ever federal legislation to address this issue. He lives in Sag Harbor, NY.”