Paul A. MacNamara

“Teaching in the jail system is a surreal experience, a whole other existence. In this bizarreness you encounter things that make you shake your head, shake your fist, cry your heart out, laugh your head off and blow your mind. And I felt compelled to write it down to capture its un-realness."

Paul A. MacNamara is a best‑selling author whose work probes resilience, justice, and the complexities of the human condition.

Paul worked as an educator in several Australian correctional centres and as a teacher in the juvenile justice system. His debut book, The Criminal Class: Memoir of a Prison Teacher (Big Sky Publishing)described his experience as an everyday teacher who made the precarious career transition to an Education Officer in the prison system and sparked nationwide media coverage across radio, television, podcasts, newspapers, and magazines. 

Paul's second book, Inside Juvie: A Teacher’s Story (Big Sky Publishing) is a gripping look at teaching in the volatile world of juvenile detention. The book climbed into Amazon’s Top Ten lists. 

Both The Criminal Class and Inside Juvie have been optioned for screen adaptation by Curtis Pitt and Rolling Jaffa (Australian Screen Network).