A Place to Stand

A memoir of life before, during, and immediately after the years spent in a maximum-security prison. Illiterate at the age of twenty-one and facing five to ten years behind bars for selling drugs, A Place to Stand is Baca's remarkable tale of how Jimmy Santiago Baca emerged after his years in the penitentiary -- much of it spent in isolation -- with the ability to read and a passion for writing poetry. A vivid portrait of life inside a maximum-security prison and an affirmation of one man's spirit in overcoming the most brutal adversity. Baca is now a celebrated, award-winning poet whose themes of social justice and work in the community have won him many friends and fans.