Thursday, March 10, 2011

Book Review: Don't Shoot! I'm the Guitar Man

This book intrigued me because it's a true life story of a man, Buzzy Martin, teaching criminals to play the guitar in jail.  It was written in diary style with each entry detailing Buzzy's visit's to the jail and his thoughts and impressions of the event.  One of the driving motivations for his participation at the jail, (and I assume, writing the book) was his work at juvenile detention centers.

In his experience, some juvenile delinquents look forward to jail and relish jail time a badge of manhood.  Buzzy wanted not only to help those in the jail, but also to bring real life stories to the detention center to help persuade the "lost souls" in detention to turn their lives around while they still had time.

Having said all that I hated this book.  It was terribly written.  Each journal entry has a lot of the same insights as the entry before that.  There is no plot and no flow.  Under severe editing, this book could really be amazing, but as it stands, it's a mess.  There is also excessive profanity and frequent sexual references.

Full disclosure: I received a copy of this book for free from Media Guests in exchange for my candid review of the book.


2 comments:

Molly said...

I have read it too, I don't think you understood it as well as you might think. It was written in that fashion to keep the "story" the "real" way it happened. I feel bad that you hated it, but, I really got a lot out of it. I came to understand that outside of the area in which I live...there are kids with no hope, no guidance and no respect. All those things together, mean they don't return that respect to those they should, they only respect the people who are leading them down the wrong paths.

Jenna Wood said...

I'm so glad that you commented, Molly! I'm actually really glad that you liked it. I have a FAVORITE book that a bunch of my friends hate and couldn't get into. I think differences in opinions are needed.