He was a novelist

More than just a musician, Cash. Simply put, he is a writer. As a young child, he created drawings and poetry; as a teenager, he created stories; and even after enlisting in the Air Force, he kept writing. While he was serving in the Air Force, his first piece of published writing, titled "Hey Porter," was published in the military publication Stars and Stripes (a title later that was recycled for one of his first hits). Year after year, he penned letters to his loved ones, friends, and even to himself. Additionally, he wrote two autobiographies Cash: The Autobiography (1997) and Man in Black (1975), both of which he wrote longhand on lined notebook paper.

Many people are unaware of Cash's ability to write novels. He wrote the fictional six-year biography of the apostle Paul, including his conversion on the road to Damascus, and published Man in White in 1986. The book is a result of Cash's early 1980s interest in Bible study, which grew as a result of his relapse into his 1960s-era prescription drug addiction.

It is not difficult to draw comparisons between Cash, a blind man who was miraculously restored from blindness by "a man clothed in the white shirt," and Paul, a Pharisee who came to Christ by a spectacular conversion from blindness. The book was moderately successful and had generally favorable reviews, mostly from religious journals, but more importantly, Cash was proud of it and regarded it as one of his greatest achievements.