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Time of Grace: Thoughts on Nature, Family, and the Politics of Crime and Punishment
“I hole up in my own cozy cubicle and write, considering ways to make the approaching Thanksgiving holiday not just another day in this place. In prison, hope faces east; time is measured in wake-ups.”
Time of Grace is a remarkable book, written with great eloquence by a former science teacher who was incarcerated for twelve years for his sexual liaison with a teenage student. Far more than a “prison memoir,” it is an intimate and revealing look at relationships—with fellow humans and with the surprising wildlife of the Sonoran Desert, both inside and beyond prison walls. Throughout, Ken Lamberton reflects on human relations as they mimic and defy those of the natural world, whose rhythms calibrate Lamberton’s days and years behind bars. He writes with candor about his life, while observing desert flora and fauna with the insight and enthusiasm of a professional naturalist. While he studies a tarantula digging her way out of the packed earth and observes Mexican freetail bats sailing into the evening sky, Lamberton ruminates on his crime and on the wrenching effects it has had on his wife and three daughters. He writes of his connections with his fellow inmates—some of whom he teaches in prison classes—and with the guards who control them, sometimes with inexplicable cruelty. And he unflinchingly describes a prison system that has gone horribly wrong—a system entrapped in a self-created web of secrecy, fear, and lies. This is the final book of Lamberton’s trilogy about the twelve years he spent in prison. Readers of his earlier books will savor this last volume. Those who are only now discovering Lamberton’s distinctive voice—part poet, part scientist, part teacher, and always deeply, achingly human—will feel as if they are making a new friend. Gripping, sobering, and beautifully written, Lamberton’s memoir is an unforgettable exploration of crime, punishment, and the power of the human spirit.
Time of Grace is a remarkable book, written with great eloquence by a former science teacher who was incarcerated for twelve years for his sexual liaison with a teenage student. Far more than a “prison memoir,” it is an intimate and revealing look at relationships—with fellow humans and with the surprising wildlife of the Sonoran Desert, both inside and beyond prison walls. Throughout, Ken Lamberton reflects on human relations as they mimic and defy those of the natural world, whose rhythms calibrate Lamberton’s days and years behind bars. He writes with candor about his life, while observing desert flora and fauna with the insight and enthusiasm of a professional naturalist. While he studies a tarantula digging her way out of the packed earth and observes Mexican freetail bats sailing into the evening sky, Lamberton ruminates on his crime and on the wrenching effects it has had on his wife and three daughters. He writes of his connections with his fellow inmates—some of whom he teaches in prison classes—and with the guards who control them, sometimes with inexplicable cruelty. And he unflinchingly describes a prison system that has gone horribly wrong—a system entrapped in a self-created web of secrecy, fear, and lies. This is the final book of Lamberton’s trilogy about the twelve years he spent in prison. Readers of his earlier books will savor this last volume. Those who are only now discovering Lamberton’s distinctive voice—part poet, part scientist, part teacher, and always deeply, achingly human—will feel as if they are making a new friend. Gripping, sobering, and beautifully written, Lamberton’s memoir is an unforgettable exploration of crime, punishment, and the power of the human spirit.
208 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 2007
18 people want to read
About the author
Ken Lamberton
10 books9 followersWhen I published my first book Wilderness and Razor Wire (Mercury House, 2000), the San Francisco Chronicle called it an "…entirely original: an edgy, ferocious, subtly complex collection of essays….” The book won the 2002 John Burroughs Medal for outstanding nature writing. I have published four books and more than a hundred articles and essays in places like the Los Angeles Times, Arizona Highways, the Gettysburg Review, and The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2000. In 2007, I won a Soros Justice Fellowship for my fourth book, Time of Grace: Thoughts on Nature, Family, and the Politics of Crime and Punishment (University of Arizona Press, 2007). My latest book is about Arizona’s "Dry River," the Santa Cruz.
In 2015 the University of Arizona will publish my sixth book, Chasing Arizona: One Man’s Yearlong Obsession with the Grand Canyon State. It is a 20,000-mile joyride that takes the reader across the state to 52 destinations in 52 weeks. I hold degrees in biology and creative writing from the University of Arizona and live with my wife in a 1890s stone cottage near Bisbee. Visit my website at: www.kenlamberton.com
In 2015 the University of Arizona will publish my sixth book, Chasing Arizona: One Man’s Yearlong Obsession with the Grand Canyon State. It is a 20,000-mile joyride that takes the reader across the state to 52 destinations in 52 weeks. I hold degrees in biology and creative writing from the University of Arizona and live with my wife in a 1890s stone cottage near Bisbee. Visit my website at: www.kenlamberton.com
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March 13, 2023
I would have ranked this book higher had it not been for the transphobia & homophobia I was surprised to find in its pages. I was also disappointed that Ken’s critique of mass incarceration & the prison industrial complex (including prosecution of crimes deemed as sex offenses) didn’t go far enough, missing an opportunity to push readers further toward an abolitionist framework (which I understand is not part of his political analysis or lens.) Still, his writing was beautiful & the ability to find and reflect on the natural world in the most unnatural of places was inspiring and insightful, with relevant & lasting lessons for all of us, inside and outside the prison walls.
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