Dream Dealer by Greg Newbold

Dream Dealer is the kind of book you pick up expecting a wild ride, then quickly realise it’s going to make you think, too.

Greg Newbold’s story has an irresistible headline hook; from prisoner to professor - the extraordinary life of New Zealand's leading criminologist. But what makes it genuinely compelling is the plainspoken and authentic way he tells it. He doesn’t glamorise the chaos and wrap everything up in a neat ‘and then I became inspirational’ arc. He simply tells you what happened.

It starts with a seemingly stable 1950s Auckland childhood, later shaken by his mother’s alcoholism. He leaves school young then arrives at university just as the 1970s culture of partying and experimentation is taking off. From there, it’s an almost inevitable slide from using drugs to dealing them.

Always a risk-taker, he begins selling the very drugs he’s taking. Soon he is arrested and charged with offering to sell 34 grams of heroin to a police informant. He was convicted and sentenced to seven-and-a-half years imprisonment, spending the first half of his sentence in maximum-security at Paremoremo before being transferred to a prison camp. 

These chapters are some of the strongest, not because they sensationalise prison, but because you can see the future criminologist forming on the page. Nicknamed the ‘Dream Dealer' by a fellow inmate, it’s at Paremoremo that Greg begins to seriously consider his future. He knows his best chance of rescuing his life lies in continuing his studies inside. He throws himself into study and it's clear this isn’t easy, it requires sustained effort, focus and discipline. The fact that he produces a groundbreaking MA thesis in anthropology on the social organisation of Paremoremo Prison while still incarcerated captures the essence of Dream Dealer. He’s living the experience and analysing it at the same time. 

After his release, Greg completes a PhD, becomes a lecturer at Canterbury University, rising to become one of New Zealand's leading criminologists. The second half of the book - his release and re-entry into society is my favourite part. Greg writes candidly about how surreal and difficult freedom can be after prison, and how rebuilding a life is slow, messy work. His later academic career feels earned, not staged. There’s also a fascinating side thread where he’s involved in the Committee of Inquiry into Oakley psychiatric hospital, which helped lead to its closure. It widens the book from one man’s transformation into a sharper look at institutions, questioning who they help, hurt and what gets ignored until someone forces it into the open.“Going to jail redirected me and changed the course of my life. It was the best thing that could have happened. I came out of jail a better and wiser person than when I went in. I have no regrets about that,” says Greg.

Overall, Dream Dealer is quick to read, straight to the point and quietly gripping. Greg isn’t asking you to excuse his crime or anyone else’s. He’s simply showing us what it looks like when someone refuses to be defined by the worst thing they’ve done and what it actually takes to build a different life.

Greg Newbold is Professor Emeritus in sociology at the University of Canterbury. During his 32-year career at the university, he published more than 100 academic articles and 10 books, mainly in the field of criminology. He lives in the Bay of Plenty.

Reviewer: Andrea Molloy

Allen & Unwin