Keeplock Entertainment Inc.

.Frank C. Matthews



“The best stories come from everyday life, and I intend to tell those stories…”

Prison. Not the average place you would expect to find a prodigious and profound author. But that’s where Frank C. Matthews honed his craft during the ten years he spent behind bars. The triumphant journey of Matthews from inmate to author is no ordinary one. The New York City native grew up with aspirations of one day becoming a household name as an NBA superstar. His dream took a detour (but the end result will be the same).

The lure of the streets and its fast money took Matthews away from hoops and into another game—the drug trade—where he found instant success. But a deal gone bad eventually landed him behind bars. Once incarcerated, Matthews had few options of how to spend his seemingly unending time. Taking advantage of the still and silent nights, Matthews spent hours plunged into “fictional” worlds created by two of the most renowned storytellers in African-American history—Iceberg Slim and Donald Goines.

The books empowered Matthews and awakened in him the creative bug to tell the stories locked inside of him.

“Incarceration transformed me,” said Frank. “I went from a young, frustrated, and confused boy to a mature, humble, and pensive man.”

Much the way Malcolm X used the power of words to transform himself in prison, Frank C. Matthews used the power of the pen to write his way to freedom, real freedom. He found his purpose. He would write his stories in notebooks, on torn-open envelopes, and anything he could get his hands on and would pass them around through the system. While some traded cigarettes, Frank Matthews traded stories and they were in huge demand among the inmates.

By the time he was released, he had a following, an audience and enough material to produce several bestselling novels. Matthews found his style of writing to be unique, labeling it “True Fiction,” a fictional take on real events that he had witnessed firsthand and experienced through the eyes of others. Unlike the so-called street novels, Matthews takes more from the masters, Slim and Goines, in weaving tales of underworld crime, drama, brotherhood, and love.

After numerous failed attempts at landing a publishing deal, Matthews did what he has always learned to do—create opportunities for himself. He self-published one his first novels, Respect the Jux, and it caught fire, selling more than ten thousand copies. It also caught the attention of everyone from rappers Jay-Z, Ghostface Killer, and 50 Cents (who rapped on Lloyd Banks’s single, “Hands up, if you want to party with crooks you have to learn to Respect the Jux!”) to literary greats like bestselling author and publisher Karen Hunter.

Karen Hunter not only saw something in the books produced by Matthews, she saw also the “it” factor in Matthews himself and promptly signed him to her publishing label, Karen Hunter Publishing, an imprint of Gallery Books at Simon & Schuster.

Respect the Jux is the first of several Matthews book to be released by Karen Hunter Publishing. Respect the Jux will etch a place for Frank C. Matthews in the literary annals. The gripping tale chronicles the life of Cat, who left the mean streets of Jamaica to land on the mean streets of America. After a stint in the military, Cat returned with newfound skills and a desire for the America Dream—by any means necessary.

Using his extensive military background in weapons and intelligence, Cat formed “The Order,” a band of thieves that specialized in pulling off juxes, which Matthews describes as robbing people (especially those involved in criminal activity) not by force or violence but through surveillance, study, and intelligence.

Based on the author’s life experiences and hard-won knowledge, this is a powerful tale of brotherhood, greed, and power.

Frank C. Matthews has invigorated a method of storytelling that has been dormant for more than thirty-five years. When Respect the Jux hits the shelves nationwide in September, the style made famous by Slim and Goines will be reborn…with a 21st Century twist!



RESPECT THE JUX

A Novel Based on True Events

Don’t do the crime, if you can’t do it right.