Where Excuses Go to Die

WHERE EXCUSES GO TO DIE is John Nelson's irreverent coming-of-age journey through a series of ludicrous places where excuses are everywhere — and worth nothing. The former "bookstore bandit" served 10 months in the bowels of the L.A. Men's Central Jail, where he crossed paths with just about everything that place is making headlines for today. Then he was shipped to the brand new, yet-to-be populated Wasco State Prison.

When Nelson arrived on one of the first busloads of inmates, fields of construction debris offered weaponizable scraps and electric doors stuck halfway, trapping inmates and staff alike. Lights flickered endlessly; drinking water sporadically ran black. So much of the facility was unfinished that gang members, arriving daily, didn't know where to lay claim. Administrators, meanwhile, couldn't spend money fast enough during this showcase stage: they hired musicians and standup comics to keep the restless and growing populace distracted.

Out of that profligacy came a chance encounter with the late comedienne Lotus Weinstock, with whom Nelson struck up a friendship. Between Weinstock and the urging of civilian employees and teachers, he entered a statewide prison writing competition, placed third, and never looked back.

WHERE EXCUSES GO TO DIE tells the poignant and often hilarious tale of these "first responders of rehabilitation" — strangers, friends, and family who saw a dumb kid's potential and cared enough to tell him so. It's also about how Nelson, ever the instigator, defied penitentiary defeatism, bigotry, and cell house rules to become his own inmate and eventually his own man.