“That was the greatest hurt, more than the tire or the kitten. I was feeling hurt and looking to get over some of my feelings; right next door to them was a vacant apartment, not fully vacant, though. There was a mattress; I pulled it up, dragged it to the walls next to them, and set it on fire. I can’t remember if I told my mother this and the effort I took to start that fire. Well, the building burnt down.”
– an excerpt from the book
ARPress is honored to publish Boki by Jimmy J. Holloway. This book is now available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and the ARPress website. A book about a journey through pain, survival, and self-discovery.
In today’s world, where conversations around trauma, resilience, and identity are finally gaining the spotlight they deserve, Jimmy J. Holloway’s Boki lands like a powerful soul cry from the depths of lived experience. As communities wrestle with cycles of poverty, addiction, and broken family systems, issues seen in headlines and households alike, Holloway’s brutally honest memoir feels like a voice echoing from both the past and present.
Boki is not just a book; it’s a lived testimony. Told in the first person, it chronicles Holloway’s turbulent journey from a fatherless boy navigating Brooklyn, Harlem, and the Bronx, to a man shaped by streets, struggle, military life, and an unyielding desire to survive and understand his place in the world. Named after the nickname given by his beloved grandmother, Boki’s story pulses with the rawness of urban life, gangs, drugs, abuse, broken systems, but also the quiet, often unnoticed presence of love, hope, and redemption.
Holloway’s writing is deeply personal, unfiltered, and poetic. From the trauma of near-assault, witnessing death, and adolescent exploitation to moments of joy found in basketball courts, first kisses, and homemade Easter outfits starched with pride, Boki paints a picture that is both heartbreaking and humanizing. He doesn’t flinch in exposing his missteps, from petty theft to poor decisions, but neither does he hide the deep well of love and strength instilled in him by the women in his life, his grandmother, mother, and aunt.
One of the most striking elements of the memoir is its honesty about masculinity and survival. Holloway doesn’t glorify the choices he made but instead explores the forces that shaped them; poverty, a need for protection, and a hunger for belonging. His reflections on forgiveness, especially after traumatic events, are profound. “It took me many years to understand forgiveness,” he writes, a line that resonates deeply in a world struggling to reconcile harm with healing.
In a nutshell, Boki is a lesson in understanding rather than judgment. It asks us to look at people not as products of failure but as survivors of a system designed to forget them. It also honors the invisible labor of Black women who held families together, often while bleeding themselves.
Jimmy J. Holloway has not just written a book. He’s written a memory map for anyone who’s ever felt unseen, unheard, or misunderstood. And in doing so, he offers readers not just his story, but a mirror and a challenge: to listen, to learn, and to love without conditions.
In a time when America continues to wrestle with the long-lasting effects of systemic inequality, fatherless households, addiction, and cycles of trauma within underserved communities, stories like Boki are more relevant than ever. With rising conversations around generational trauma, inner-city violence, and the invisible struggles of Black youth, Jimmy J. Holloway’s memoir feels like a lived reflection of headlines we see today. From increasing rates of childhood poverty to the mental health crisis affecting young men of color, the story of Boki offers both a mirror and a map, showing us what it means to grow up in a world that’s often stacked against you, and still fight to define your own manhood, dignity, and truth. No matter how dark the past may be, your story has the power to illuminate someone else’s path. Healing begins with truth, and Boki proves that every scar tells a story worth reading.
Boki by Jimmy J. Holloway is now available for purchase via the ARPress Bookstore.