Three things that struck me as I read Inside, were these:
1. The rigorous honesty of Mr. Santos.
2. The absolute accuracy of Mr. Santos' 'ear' for jargon, slang and prison profanity
3. The overwhelming sense of clarity I received regarding Mr. Santos' sense of who he was, who he now is, and how he became the man he is today.
Translation: Possibly the best 'prison' book I've ever read next to 'In the Belly of the Beast" by Jack Henry Abbott.
Mr. Santos' doesn't come close to Mr. Abbott's often times overwrought and dense philosophies regarding prison life (Abbott wrote more in essay form, as Santos writes more in narrative form) but then, Abbott's book was compiled from a series of letters written to Norman Mailer, so Abbott was hitting, through his writing, one-way line drives into the catcher's mitt of his audience. Mr. Santos is telling us a story here, and so his writing has the natural ebbs and flows of a story, whereas Abbott's book is simply a red-hot laser of accusation, opinion and deep, dark thought - very deep and dark thought.
What I found validating however, was how Mr. Santos stood to-to-toe with with Mr. Abbott on 'just the facts' of [life in] a penitentiary and how he also stood on even footing with another proven and literary award-winning prison author, Edward Bunker. Even decades after Mr. Bunker's incarcerations at Folsom and San Quentin prisons, and the subsequent books he produced (some of which were turned into films) including, 'No Beast So Fierce," and 'The Animal Factory,' Mr. Santos writes as if he were a contemporary of Mr. Bunker's, proving perhaps his, and Mr. Abbott's claims that in our country, the penitentiary system and its penal codes and methodologies are outmoded, draconian and are, in many instances, crafted to retard the very "rehabilitation" tax payers expect our prison systems to effect upon those they are charged with housing.
From a sheer 'ear' standpoint, Mr. Santos may take the prize. Not since Jimmy Lerner's memoir, 'You Got Nothin' Coming!" have I read such precisely accurate slang and jargon. Mr. Santos captures the lurid, crass and ignorant language of his fellows with a flawless ear. So much so, perhaps in a strange way, Mr. Santos has made a case for Congress to enact laws to either recognize a new Language in America--call it OGese (Original Gansta-ese) or, to pass laws that make it illegal to slaughter the English language and the grammatical mortar which holds it together such as his fellow felons do.
Overriding all of this however, at the completion of this bright, clarifying and optimistic book, is the unimpeachable fact that Mr. Santos is ready to be set free. He has not only paid his debt to the law's of the society that he betrayed as a young man, but he has repaid it with large doses of service-soaked interest in the forms of two college degrees and a partial Ph.D, classes taught to fellow prisoners and lessons taught, via video conference, to university students. He has paid it with this wonderful book and his previous books on life in prison, and he has paid it with his awareness and his level-headed telling of how he was, what happened, and who and what he is today, and what's happening to him now, and what he not only expects to happen, but what he expects to make happen in his future on his continuing road of self-imposed rehabilitation.
Surely, Mr. Santos is not a Saint (he's witnessed murders and crimes in prison and has not "told"), and certainly he is not the first, nor will he be the last felon to self-educate, and write literary gems from a prison cell. But from this book, which details Mr. Santos' every effort to better himself physically, educationally, spiritually and socially, we see clearly that here is a man more than capable of being released to join the general citizenry, and making, and doing good - for himself and for others - for decades to come.
When I finished reading and then, reading again, the books of Edward Bunker, I wanted to meet him to say, "I loved your books!" When I finished "Inside," I thought, if I ever meet Michael Santos, I'd like to ask him, "Now, will you please show me how to be more like you?"
If one could snap their fingers and get wishes granted, I'd snap for the following:
1. That a producer of 60 Minutes get on the Michael Santos story and get his story on the air
2. That walking through the streets of Manhattan, I'd begin seeing 'Free Michael Santos' tee shirts
3. That Michael Santos is released - soon - and that he have a wonderfully joyous, fulfilling second half to his life.
I don't think anyone will have to snap for number three, though. He will.
