CHICAGO - s4story -- What is life really like in prison? Not just the tough guys flexing muscles or wise old long-time convicts offering sage advice seen in the movies, but the drudgery, the small victories and losses, and the philosophizing, that mark day-to-day prison existence—and existentialism.

Deric Whaley tells the real story in his book The Ride.

Whaley did some time as an inmate in Illinois's prison system and provides a perspective that only an insider can.

"It's called The Ride because once you open up the first page, you know you'll be going on quite a ride when you read this book," Whaley says.

"I wrote this book so people could experience the personal journey of an individual being incarcerated," he explains.

"The first group I hope will read it would be teenagers, because reading is fundamental to education and if you can motivate youngsters to read, you'll motivate them to become educatable," Whaley continues. "When they read the book I want them to become educated as to what's happening in society and be educated to avoid having to undergo the experience I did."

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Whaley also hopes college and university students, particularly those studying the social sciences, will read The Ride, "so they can get a firsthand experience of an individual going through that incarceration process," he says. "Maybe somewhere down the line, when they become psychologists or sociologists or work with the public, they could look at the behaviors that cause individuals to become incarcerated and help them avoid committing antisocial acts in the first place."

The Ride is "a different kind of prison book because it has a personalized experience of the day-to-day internal feelings and emotions of being incarcerated," Whaley explains. "Those raw emotions are there in the book so you can feel what an incarcerated person feels and experiences—without having to be incarcerated yourself."

Prison gives people a lot of time to think, and philosophizing is part of the experience. In The Ride, Whaley writes:

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"An individual should help as many people as possible. When you share, you're blessed with more."

"Faith is the substance of all things hoped for, the evidence of all things not seen."

"I'm a survivor, and I'll survive."

"Losers do what they want to do. Winners do what they must."

The Ride is published by Newman Springs Publishing of Red Bank, NJ, and is available in paperback and digital version from Amazon.com (https://www.amazon.com/-/es/Deric-Whaley/dp/B0CR2TKK94), Barnes and Noble, and other booksellers.