Orange Is the New Black: My Year in a Women's Prison Author: Piper Kerman | Language: English | ISBN:
B0036S4B6M | Format: PDF
Orange Is the New Black: My Year in a Women's Prison Description
NOW A NETFLIX ORIGINAL SERIES • #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER With a career, a boyfriend, and a loving family, Piper Kerman barely resembles the reckless young woman who delivered a suitcase of drug money ten years before. But that past has caught up with her. Convicted and sentenced to fifteen months at the infamous federal correctional facility in Danbury, Connecticut, the well-heeled Smith College alumna is now inmate #11187–424—one of the millions of people who disappear “down the rabbit hole” of the American penal system. From her first strip search to her final release, Kerman learns to navigate this strange world with its strictly enforced codes of behavior and arbitrary rules. She meets women from all walks of life, who surprise her with small tokens of generosity, hard words of wisdom, and simple acts of acceptance. Heartbreaking, hilarious, and at times enraging, Kerman’s story offers a rare look into the lives of women in prison—why it is we lock so many away and what happens to them when they’re there.
Praise for Orange Is the New Black “Fascinating . . . The true subject of this unforgettable book is female bonding and the ties that even bars can’t unbind.”
—People (four stars) “I loved this book. It’s a story rich with humor, pathos, and redemption. What I did not expect from this memoir was the affection, compassion, and even reverence that Piper Kerman demonstrates for all the women she encountered while she was locked away in jail. I will never forget it.”
—Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love “This book is impossible to put down because [Kerman] could be you. Or your best friend. Or your daughter.”
—Los Angeles Times “Moving . . . transcends the memoir genre’s usual self-centeredness to explore how human beings can always surprise you.”
—USA Today “It’s a compelling awakening, and a harrowing one—both for the reader and for Kerman.”
—Newsweek.com Look for special features inside. Join the Random House Reader’s Circle for author chats and more.- File Size: 1569 KB
- Print Length: 322 pages
- Page Numbers Source ISBN: 0385523386
- Publisher: Spiegel & Grau (April 6, 2010)
- Sold by: Random House LLC
- Language: English
- ASIN: B0036S4B6M
- Text-to-Speech: Enabled
X-Ray:
- Lending: Not Enabled
- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #302 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
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- #1
in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Social Sciences > Criminology - #1
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in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Politics & Social Sciences > Crime & Criminals > Penology
I got interested in reading Orange is the New Black after reading an excerpt in the New York Times, and reading an article from Piper's fiance Larry in the Times as well. I just finished it, and I found it really interesting - the details she provides on life in prison, the rituals, the jobs, the treatment of prisoners, is really fascinating and a view on a minimum security prison I'd never seen before. But I was often frustrated with Kerman's lack of details - I had no sense of how it was that she was free to just go do yoga or run around the track whenever she wanted, or what kind of hours she worked at her electric and construction jobs. I was really moved by the descriptions of the other women in prison and of the friendships she formed, but I also had trouble keeping the women straight, especially when she'd bring up a name that she hadn't mentioned in several chapters, and I would try to remember who Delicious or Pom-Pom or Toni was.
I did find her to be a bit smug, going out of her way to explain that while most prisoners kept to their ethnic "tribes," she was friends with everyone, other prisoners came to her for help with their homework or legal work, she lent out all of her books and gave away all of her possessions, etc. While I liked her voice, I felt she went overboard in trying to portray herself as non-racist, and as someone who didn't feel above everyone she was incarcerated with.
Mostly though, I was disappointed in the ending. For the last 100 pages, I was looking forward to the end, to what happens when Piper gets home. She ruminates a lot on the balance between getting used to prison rituals but not getting so comfortable that you forget the outside world, so I wanted to know how she found the adjustment to home, whether there was any tension with Larry.
Didn't everyone really go to high school with Piper Kerman? She is just the stereotypical, little, mean-girl, blonde, who was born with a silver spoon in her mouth. She makes an absolutely abysmal life choice, that she shrugs off as happening due to her being bored and adventurous, even though life has given her every advantage, and after 11 years finds herself dropped into the middle of the cesspool that is the American prison system. Piper weathers this storm by cleverly befriending the ethnically diverse group of unfortunate inmates that she discovers are as heartbreakingly vulnerable to being befriended by the homecoming queen with the acid tongue and entitled attitude as the poor homely and uncool girls in any high school in the country would be.
Piper is a shameless narcissist. While she is receiving more visitors, mail and commissary money than she knows what to do with from her uber supportive and financially well-off family and friends and benefitting from the best legal defense money can buy, she regales the reader with tales of the poor, UGLY, uneducated, inmates that occupy Danbury Federal Prison in Connecticut. These poor woman have suffered from lack of decent legal representation and Lord knows what other horrors in their lives and Piper congratulates herself ad nauseam for being kind to them...which in reality, is really all that she can do to survive in her new environment.
I have had this on my TBR list for a long time and decided to finally read it when I heard about the series available on Netflix. I found myself alternating between being disgusted at the vapid Kerman and being just bored and disinterested in the narrative.
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