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In the Sanctuary of Outcasts: A Memoir
Neil White
#UE6312
Paperback, 316 pages; 2010 (2009)
$14.99
 Members' Price: $12.74
When he arrived at a Federal prison in Carville, Louisiana, to serve a sentence for bank fraud in 1993, magazine entrepreneur and family man Neil White learned that the 100-year-old facility was also home to the last leper colony in the continental United States. Though fraternizing between inmates and patients was forbidden, White's work detail put him in daily contact with often badly disfigured victims of Hansen's disease (once known as leprosy), who had been taken from their families years earlier and forcibly quarantined in this clandestine community. Neil White's memoir of his year among criminals and outcasts charts his journey from arrogance to humility, with the help of a colorful cast of characters including convicted killers and thieves, saintly clergy members, and the patients of the colony, whose kindness and optimism despite their brutal treatment by society inspired White to become a better person. Told with disarming candor and tender insight, In the Sanctuary of Outcasts is at once comical and poignant, making for a surprisingly uplifting and compellingly moving read.
(AG)
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