I Once Killed a Man, but Don't Tell your Mother: A Collection of Stories and Family Secrets

What life experiences are necessary for someone to devise an elaborate plan to take another person's life? What is the motivator to either bring that plan to fruition or allow it to go unachieved? Further, what motivates the author to memorialize something so fraught with liability? In his debut book, Darien Ogburn examines his upbringing, varied experiences, and familial circumstances to uncover why he spent an inordinate amount of energy strategizing how to exact capital revenge on the people that so egregiously wounded his family.

Equal parts self-deprecating and self-aggrandizing, I Once Killed a Man, but Don't Tell Your Mother outlines the experiences required for such an effort using the one constant in the author's life--humor. The reader will learn about the author's time as a professional baseball player (for one day), how he came to write a joke for the president of the United States, and several other defining moments in his life. The loss of his first son was one of these moments, as was the birth of his daughter and second son. Each of these events left indelible marks on the author that helped him choose the right person to kill.

Using wit and absurdity, the author takes readers along a retrospective journey to better understand his experiences in the context of who he is and the legacy he wants to leave behind.