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Summary: A Powerful Story....
Review: I was deeply moved by Ms. Bandele's story. While I am not involved with anyone, let alone someone in prison, she somehow managed to speak to me, a single, childless college grad who loves poetry and the arts and all they have to offer. Her language flowed like music and tapped into the very things that go on inside of me. She made me feel the love that was shared between herself & Rashid. She caused me to hope that someday I will be as lucky, no...BLESSED as she in finding a love like this. I am proud and excited to have discovered this memoir and this young, black, intelligent & lyrical author/poet. I will be looking forward to many things from this woman.
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Summary: Life
Review: Life......Are we ready to experience all elements...in our eyes or others..asha bandele took her real life experiences and exposed them for the world to see so honest and candid. I could not believe all of the heart ache and pain she suffered internally loving a man in Prison.....but through it all that was where her real love exsisted confined in prison....can a love really exsit I thought but it can.......asha touched a part of me and so many woman that fall in love sometimes on the wrong side of the tracks but she rows to the ocassion......and told the world that you could be in love...... amongst all odds and as for POWER in the relationship....it lies in both partners as well as strength and sacrifices.......but that's life....I recommend this book to the world....
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Summary: A Deeply Moving Love Story
Review: Bandele begins The Prisoner's Wife with "This is a love story." And it is. With poetic words and beautiful, descriptive detail, Bandele tells the reader how and why she came to marry a man serving 20 years to life, and what she has gained and sacrificed by being with him. She really bares her soul, and shares deeply personal and painful information about her past, and about her marriage. When I started reading this book, someone saw the title, and started saying how they couldn't understand why so many women marry men who are incarcerated. And, before I read this book, I wondered the same thing. But what I got out of The Prisoner's Wife is that just like in a relationship between two people in the outside world, asha and Rashid had needs, and they have helped one another in fulfilling those needs. Even though my own husband is not in prison, I saw a lot of similarities between asha and Rashid's relationship and ours. And I can understand 100% what she writes at the end of the first chapter: "We were exactly the same and we were completely different...never meant to be together...always meant to save each other." I was very touched by this story, and devoured this book in a day. The only thing I was disappointed by was the ending. I didn't quite understand the purpose of the letter, or what happened to make Bandele write it. And because of that lack of clarity, I was left wondering about their relationship. Otherwise, this was an excellent, beautiful, touching book.
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Summary: The Prisnors Wife
Review: This book is to be commended because it clearly and explicitly portrays the life of a woman who's soul mate is incarcirated. This was the first time in my life that I read something that even came close to my reality. It was so honest and raw that I couldn't put it down. Most of all it was theraputic because until I read this book, I felt I was the only one going thru this and nobody really understood. I am currently living this situation but unlike Asha, my fiance doesn't have life tacked onto the end of his sentence. It felt good to hear someone reveal how foul the prison system is and how rude and insensitive the guards are. But most of all it was wonderful to read how ones life was chainged for the good due to this unpleasant experience. Like Rashid, my fiance will also be a better person when he comes home because of this situation, then he was going in to it. The Lord really does have a way of taking something that was meant for bad and working it out for his good! Asha please reveal your email address and do a AUTHORS COMMENT, because some of us would love to personally thank you for adding new strenth to our very sensitive situation. YOU GO GIRL!
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Summary: The Book that's yet to be written!
Review: I haven't read the book but I am living it! And as soon as I read it I will send it to my man so that he can read it also and we can share our thoughts on it. This is what I've been looking for;someone who can relate to me and what I am going through by being in love with someone who is in prison. I too can relate to the excerpt that I read from Asha's book, and the book that has yet to be written to describe actually how it is to be in love with someone who committed a crime and got caught;which is the only difference between them and us out here who commit crimes every day with our actions, deeds, and with our mouths;but never get caught. We can't continue to judge people by where they are or what they have done without actually getting to know who they are because only God can judge. No one is perfect because he who is without sin let him cast the first stone! I can only speak from my point of view on this subject because I am a Christian sister who prayed for specific things that only God knew about and He divinely connected me to a man who is everything that I wanted and needed. I wasn't looking for love but love found me in one of the most ugliest places where most people are afraid to go. He committed a crime that he is paying for. He has changed through time and years and he is not the same man that he was when he first go locked up 11 years ago and he will not be the same man when he walks out of those prison walls in 2007. Prison in no means can define the actual man. There are some men in the prison system who may never change, but there are some who are incarcerated and good God fearing men who have changed through time, which is possible.Some people think that people can't change, and some can't but God can change someone's heart. Weak women usually walk away without finding out or toughing it out. It takes a strong woman to deal with the every day realities one must face to even be involved with someone in prison. And to commit ones self to someone in prison takes more strenght that so many people who criticize can't even begin to realize. Before someone on the outside looking in begins to criticize one's motives by being in a commited relationship with someone who is prison;just think if you have a daughters,sister, or niece,who is to say that they may not find their Prince Charming behind prison walls. I'm not saying that's where you should look for love, but God works in mysterious ways. If a man is in prison, that in no way defines him because prison can't define my man who I love and one day will say "I do" to. I followed my heart in this relationship and I'm in love with a brother who is more free than some of these brothers out here in bondage and enslaved to drugs,and alchol. Been there and done that. My man is totally honest with me in every single thing and he has nothing to hide from me;how can he? Look where he is. One bad man in prison does not define every man who is in prison. I have had to endure a lot of criticism for being involved with my man;but being in this relationship has taught me a lot and I've learned so much not to take the small things for granted. I can truthfully say that this is the best relationship that I've been in;not because I don't see him everyday, not because I don't live with him, but because true love is being able to love someone without ever having sex with him and not knowing what he looks like or feels like. When your heart is searching for true and pure love and so is his, then that may mean finding it in the dark shadows of the hallway which is the prison wall system. To each his own, this is just my reality. And there are so many others books that have yet to be written with different views, realities, triumphs, and victories. Thanks for listening, have a wonderful day!
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Summary: A Story of True Love From A Real Woman
Review: This book is for dreamers. Anyone who dares to dream of finding that special someone. Asha Bandele's memoir, A Prisoner's Wife, is not just a book. Its a testimony to the power of love. True love does exist. And the author reminds us that nothing can or will ever completly silence the power of love. It will find you and this book lets us know that there is no wall strong enough to hold it. Read this book if you want to know what true love is.
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Summary: thank you thank you thank you
Review: thank you, asha for your honesty and courage. please send word about how you and rashid are doing via author feedback! let us know when he's released! my thoughts and prayers are with you both. thanks again for your powerful book.
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Summary: Unsure Whether She Wants Sympathy
Review: I read this book in a few hours, then revisited it a few weeks later because I was still troubled by lingering questions. It was written in the sensationalist way that book publishers seem to love these days (lots of emotional melodrama and sex). At times it was a bit too cloaked in the authors ego. Were we suppose to champion Ms. Bandele for figuring out who she was? She still seemed lost to me at the end. However, I will honestly say it was interesting. But then again not every girl goes and marries a murderer. Given the authors apparent emotional immaturity and lack of a moral compass, there are huge questions that go unanswered. As an avid reader and student of memoirs/nonfiction, I can't ignore their glaring reality and the contradiction they leave. She states she doesn't want sympathy, etc., but there are so many passages that seem to say nothing but that. She engages in a linguistic guilt trip and at times she seems outright hostile at the reader. Then again, I imagine she has had to assume this position in general. She grieves for the widow of the man her husband killed. It seems phony, contrived, and above all, extremely patronizing because she doesn't seem like a nice person at all. Was anyone else reading this book with this thought in mind: I hope your husband never gets out of prison. Grow up and enjoy your visits. The authors stance seemed very apparent to me: Enlightened people will support me and this relationship. Everyone else is too conservative/racist/unenlightened to understand.
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Summary: A bleak story, well written
Review: I purchased this book because I have known several people who had boyfriends in prison. I always thought that these prisoners had a lot of time on their hands and said what they thought the listener wanted to hear in order to ensure that they would have mail and visitors. These acquantances of mine got burned in the end. I would be very wary of starting a relationship with a prisoner in light of the things I have heard. Asha weighs the issues throughout the book and seems to put a lot of thought and energy into her actions. I felt a lot of apathy for Asha; you can't fight fate, you can't fight love - and Asha struggles throughout the book and I am certain that she still is. Everyone thinks that their story is different, and is Asha's case I sincerely hope that she is right. Her writing style and language are captivating thoughout the book. There were times that I read her words over and over again and was amazed at her control of the language. Good luck, Asha. Thank you for sharing your story.
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Summary: Different... but worth the time
Review: This book is my Book Group first choice for the month of May. Upon reading the title I figured I would have to wade through all the nonsense of the justice system and how this prisoner was being treated...WRONG! This book turned out to be very good. This book is very deep. My hat goes off to Ms. Bandele. She told her story from a very real stand point. I felt the pain, the hurt and the joy she was feeling in telling her life story. The point that really stood out was that Ms. Bandele did not try to make her story smell like roses. She called a spade a spade... She also let the reader know that there is another way of loving... Not just the physical. Even though I am not dating or married to someone whom is incarcerated, I can now say that I feel for those ladies that love someone that is there. Ms. Bandele, keep the words flowing...
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