Orange is the New Black by Piper Kerman
May 30th, 2011Title: Orange is the New Black
Author: Piper Kerman
Publisher: Spiegel & Grau (2010)
Sooo….it looks like it has been a while since my last review. I’m sure you are have been devastated without them. Hopefully it will give you some relief to know that I have been reading this whole time…just haven’t been writing reviews. I thought about giving a long explanation for the reason why…but to be honest, I’m just lazy. Anyway…I thought I would try to get back into it again. We shall see. OK. Here we go!
I was looking through a Starbucks recently and taking note of the books I want to read. Most of them were business books, but this one caught my attention because prison interests me. Not so much that I care to do personal research…but enough that I have read a couple of books (Like Newjack by Ted Conover) and watch those sweet TV shows on A&E.
Orange is the New Black by Piper Kerman was an interesting look into life in a women’s prison. Immediately following college, Kerman was looking for adventure and eventually found it while traveling with a drug smuggling group. While at first she resisted actually being involved, she eventually agreed to carry money. Long story short…she got arrested after being ratted out. After 10 years of court time and delays, she was eventually sent to the Federal Pentitentiary in Danbury, CT. (Side note: This happens to be the city that I was born in. My family moved soon after that so I have literally zero recollection of the city. Nonetheless, I feel some sort of weird bond about it all. I understand this makes no rational sense).
The book takes you through the 15 months (later brought down to 13) that Kerman was sent to do time. Kerman is a pretty good storyteller and kept me entertained for most of the book. She does a nice job of describing the other people at the prison and how her relationships grew with them. It is obvious as well that she came out of prison a different person than when she went in…though I don’t think it had anything to do with rehabilitation. Because of the 10 year difference between her crime and her sentence, she seemed rehabilitated before she went in.
I think part of the intent of the book is to shed some light on the prison system and the terrible state it is in. There probably aren’t very many people who would disagree that the system probably could use some fine tuning…or an overhaul. That said, I kind of glossed over those portions because I am not interested in lectures about the prison system right now. There weren’t very many of these sections though, so it was OK.
Overall, I enjoyed the book and would recommend it to anyone interested in prison life.
Rating: 3 out of 5
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