Roberta Williams' revealing life story, from abuse to prison, Carl to the paparazzi. Throughout this underworld saga, Roberta raised four children in a suburban home.
This is a compelling collaborative memoir of two college friends, Roberta Davidson Williams, whose cultural experience as a Black woman from a Canadian background, living in Caribbean culture is uniquely different from her friend, Addie Moore Morrow Northerner, with southern roots. As the authors reflect on their experiences, they learn how their enduring trust and faith in God create a legacy for future generations. The authors attended Eastern Michigan University together. They both felt that their stories could help the next generation find hope. Writing brought forth a tumultuous journey - taking both through hurt and fond memories. Roberta and Addie both have strong ancestral foundations - their fathers rose above racist conditions to send both of their daughter's to college. Roberta's father, a Canadian railway porter, and Addie's father, a Detroit autoworker, loved beautiful landscapes and vegetable gardens. Years after their death, Roberta, a retired career horticulturist, and Addie, a retired licensed professional counselor and educator, took up the writing challenge. Roberta's book, which borrows the title from a Bible scripture, 'The Lord is the Shade upon My Right Hand,' is a journey from her safe Canadian childhood to United States' Jim Crow history and racist policies. She faced her challenges and fought for survival in the backdrop of black awareness and now credits her success to God. Roberta's book mentions the recent injustices and protests movement and her own experience in a protest sparked by the death of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, while she was attending Eastern Michigan University. Similarly, Addie's book, Angelic Testimonies, is also an acknowledgment of historical racism and its impact on her family and today's similar political discourse and fears of turning back a century of race progress to return to a time of racial divide. Addie's journey of survival is an awareness of how generational "Angels" carried her and her family through turbulent times. Angelic Testimonies appears somewhat biographical and portrays her parents' survival from Selma, Alabama, to Detroit and how she felt their entire lives were covered by God's grace to the end.
Roberta Williams' revealing life story - from abuse to prison, Carl to the paparazzi. Now, in the wake of Carl's brutal murder at the hands of a fellow inmate in Barwon Prison, Roberta is once again compelled to live her life in the public eye, all the while attending with unwavering devotion to the needs of her greatest priority - her four children. When the hitman hiding in Roberta Williams' roof confessed that he couldn't kill her, she knew she had to get herself and her kids out of the bloodiest battle the Australian underworld had ever known. Roberta's marriage to Melbourne career criminal Carl Williams had been a rollercoaster ride, but it was still a welcome antidote to her life before Carl. the youngest of seven children, her father died when she was a baby, and she was beaten by her mother and stepfather, kicked out of school for fighting and made a ward of the state at eleven. Her early romantic relationships were marked by physical abuse, including marriage to an abattoir worker with some dangerous friends, the Moran brothers. In stark contrast, Carl treated her better than any other man she'd ever known. Content with a stable family life and enjoying Carl's increasing wealth, Roberta wasn't overly concerned with her husband's occupational hazards, the police charges, the drug trafficking, the payoffs, until the bodies started turning up. She found herself tangled in a vicious web of deceit, denial and payback as the feud erupted onto the streets.
In 2007 Carl Williams was convicted of three murders and sentenced to 35 years' jail. Yet his role in the Melbourne Gangland Wars went far beyond a handful of killings, however brutal, and had made him one of the most infamous names in Australian criminal history. The unlikely gang boss with a baby face and friendly grin had played a leading role in the savage long-running conflict that saw more than 30 gang-related murders on the streets of Melbourne. Williams began serving his sentence in a high-security unit at Victoria's Barwon Prison. In October 2008 he was given access to a personal computer. Confined to a tiny cell for most of the day, and having limited contact with the outside world, the computer was a godsend. As soon as he received it, Carl began a daily correspondence with his friends and family, covering his life in jail, his thoughts and hopes for the future, and his views and opinions on everyone from barristers and judges to fellow criminals and deadly rivals. Just a year and a half later, Williams was bashed to death by a trusted friend and fellow prisoner. Using his letters, Life Sentence paints a vivid picture of Carl's last eighteen months. His writing is surprising, often manipulative, frequently self-serving, and always a fascinating and revealing insight into the mind of one of Australia's most notorious criminals. 'For years, others have spoken for Carl. In these letters, Carl tells his own story for the first time. It's like meeting the man behind the myth.' - Adam Shand
This superb series of four photocopiable manuals provides pages of practical resource materials for every aphasia therapist in a form which is conveniently accessible, imaginative and clearly laid out.
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