Review- True Escape Stories by Paul Dowswell

[Wasif Ahmed]

The True Escape Stories is a collection of eight short stories which are based on true prison breakouts. Published by Usborne the book starts with the famous prison escape of Frank Morris at Alcatraz on which a movie starring Clint Eastwood has been made as well.

The stories are well versed and written in a casual manner with simple wording. The manner of writing of the author is to be appreciated as it involves the reader completely and provides a nail biting experience. Some pages have black and white illustrations on them which show the prison layout or the route followed by the prisoner when he was escaping.

My favorite story of the book would be Ten Locked Door. The protagonist Tim Jenkins's only crime was being a part of the banned African National Congress Party or the ANC which was fighting for the right of South Africa to be a democracy. Tim was sent to Pretoria Prison in South Africa and if a person wanted to visit him, he/she had to pass through ten locked doors. The story shows the daring escape of Jenkins who forged keys for all the locked doors to ultimately regain his freedom.

The story I liked the least would be A Spy in the Scrubs. Soviet masterspy George Blake faces a 42 year sentence in London’s Wormwood prison for passing vital top secret information to Britain’s enemies while posing as a senior officer for the British Secret Service- MI6. George was a charming and courteous man who was also helpful and thus many fellow prisoners thought that his sentence was a bit too harsh. Amongst them was Sean Bourke, a former convict of the same prison, who was determined to help Blake escape. The thing I disliked about this story was that Bourke did most of the work and escaping from the prison seemed to be like a walk through the park and also was not a major part of the story.

Even though the book is titled True Escape Stories, the last story of this book is not true. Titled No Escape from Devil’s Island, this story is written in first person. The only thing true about this story is the place Devil’s Island. The name (Devil’s Island) is the alias of the prison camps in French Guinea and the story highlights the brutality faced by the prisoners who got sent there. Nonetheless the last story would have been my favorite one if it had been true.

I could go on and on about this book but I guess I should stop here. As a last word I would like to add that this book makes an exciting read for all age categories ranging between children to elderly people. The style of writing is sometimes humorous and really engaging thus making this book a definite pick if you like adventure or even action novels.