"Sometimes the best way to help the world is to make mistakes."
Our Story
Most memoirs are filled with that stuff Gramps use to call farm food or menorah. Or it comes from a famous person, who has no connection to your life. Again, more menorah. This memoir is different. It’s about being in jail not just figuratively, but actually. It’s about being an average person and watching everything you built for twenty years crumble in moments.
My Grandparents were an incredible part of our life. They were strong and helpful, until they weren’t. Life changes and we all become old. As I watched them get older, they taught me about taking pride in your life and your situation. They were amazing, elegant, and proud. Yet in the end they would fall at the drop a hat, forget what they were trying to say, and often have this lost look on their face. Their ending was tragic and my wife and I were caught in the whirlwind of craziness.
The Book
For years Will and Kay Young loved, cared for, and supported Will’s grandparents while raising young children and pursuing entrepreneurial ambitions. Then their lives turned upside down one cold, February day in 2011. A knock on their door was not an Amazon delivery, but something devastating—a police search. In moments, everything they had built for twenty years—businesses, reputations, friendships—crumbled.
Peppered with humor, Will and Kay’s adrenaline-charged and hellish ride through the legal system is the story of people doing their best to help loved ones. It’s also about being in jail—literally and figuratively—and how quickly the American dream can become a nightmare.
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Media coverage About our story
Gram said, "Opinions are like butth...., everyone has one." Now this book is our chance to tell the true story, what really happened, and how we were put in an incredibly difficult situation.
You get to decide what you would do.
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IN THE PRESS
This memoir details the heart-wrenching decision of taking a plea deal when you know you have done nothing wrong. Their lawyer summarizes the decision in several sentences: “You are not innocent until proven guilty. The public likes to use that term, but it’s not real. … The Department of Justice is like the casinos in Vegas. It looks like you can win, but the house always wins.” Their paralegal sums it up more succinctly: “You’ll lose.” The author bares his soul and reveals his deepest thoughts and secrets as the wheels of justice run over him and his wife with the relentless news media in hot pursuit. He does this to warn others about the serious consequences that can be faced for something as mundane as careless bookkeeping and misplaced business goals. In a Land-of-Oz-type story, he follows the Yellow Brick Road all the way to the Thomas County Jail, and finally his soul is set free by a Glinda-the-Good-Witch friend named Lisa. It held my complete attention from start to finish, and is written in such a compelling manner that I took a break from reading it only to eat and to sleep and to wipe the tears from my eyes.
