Redheaded Reviews: Orange Is the New Black: My Year in a Women's Prison by Piper Kerman

Warning! If you watch the Netflix TV show and are expecting to read about lots of violence and sex you will be sorely disappointed. If you are looking for a real book about life in a minimum security federal prison then this is your book.

Piper Kerman met Nora after she graduated from Smith College but had no idea what to do with her life and had a "thirst for adventure". She met Nora in her apartment building when she was holding down more than one job as a waitress. Nora suddenly left for a while then came back and rented a bigger apartment on her own and furnished it with nice things. It turns out that Nora was now in the drug-smuggling trade by way of a friend of her sister's who was "connected" and had been tutored in the ways of the drug world by and American art dealer who was also "connected". She was now a drug smuggler and was being paid quite well for it. Nora's sister Hester was dating a West African drug kingpin named Alaji. Soon, Piper and Nora began a sexual relationship and Nora was taking Piper with her on trips around the world to conduct business. Nora had young men to act as couriers and none of them ever got caught so it seemed like a only slightly risky adventure. But Piper was lying to her friends and family and seeing little of them and she was getting to be bored on these trips. When Nora asked her to carry drug money because they really needed someone to do it she did. Then a real emergency arose and she was asked to carry drugs, but the drugs never arrived at the airport where she was to pick them up so she took a plane back home to California and broke off all ties to Nora and her gang. She had had to much adventure and she thought that was the end of it.

She began her new life and started working for a TV production company. Her life was back on track. She even started dating one of her long time friends, Larry, whom she just realized she was in love with. Then the U.S. Customs office came calling and told her she had been indicted in federal court on charges of drug smuggling and money laundering. No one knew about her past with Nora and now everyone would have to know because it looked like she was going to go away to prison for some period of time. She pleaded guilty to get a lesser sentence, but before they passed the sentence Alaji was arrested in London. The Feds wanted her to testify against him so they kept her out of prison for six years while they tried to get him extradited. Eventually the British released Alaji on his own accord and Piper was to go before a judge for sentencing. She was lucky and got only fifteen months. She could have gotten up to a decade in prison.

To say prison was a real eye opener would be an understatement. But when she arrived she was given a khaki pants and top to wear, a nightgown, granny underwear, mittens, scarf, woolly hat, shoes, powder to wash your clothes in, sheets and a towel. She was quickly welcomed by others who gave her shower shoes and shampoo and a comb and soap and other things she might need. She was told not to make her bed by her bunkmate that she would make the bed and that she was not to sleep under the covers because that would mess up the bed for inspection. She was taught the first of many uses for a sanitary napkin is to clean the cell. Those with the cleanest blocks go to dinner first.

For the first month you cannot hold down a job because you haven't been cleared medically yet so there's a lot of time on your hands. She can't buy anything in the commissary until the check that Larry mailed to the prison system clears, but until then she gets help from others. And she does get mail from friends and family which include lots of books. Her friends and family start up a website for her and soon she is hearing from friends of friends and her outside support system makes things somewhat easier. She also has visitation on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. Larry comes on Fridays and stays for hours. You were patted down whenever you went in and strip searched whenever you came out and some of the guards were a bit handsy, but you put up with it to see your friends and family. She is luckier than some in that she was put in Danbury prison in Connecticut which is near her home in New York and her family in Boston.

Her first bunkmate Natalie was a quiet older woman doing eight years for who knows what. She works in the bakery so she is up early in the morning and goes to bed early at night. She is a good bunkie to have in that you can trust to ask her questions whereas you really shouldn't ask anyone in prison questions but learn by what you see. She makes a lot of friends because she is always willing to share her books or do something for a prisoner without anything in return. In prison everything costs something. About half way through her sentence they outlawed smoking in prison so cigarettes became a hot commodity. But mostly it was stuff you bought in the commissary or extra food you smuggled from the cafeteria that was used for services such as doing a manicure or someone's hair or tightening up the fit of one of your jumpsuits so that you look good for visitors day. They had a microwave that the guards looked the other way about them using to make their own meals after dinner with food purloined from dinner and bought in the commissary. Piper learned to make a mean cheesecake.

But at any moment you could be thrown in SHU (solitary holding unit) for breaking even the smallest of rules. And the COs (Corrections Officers) meant business. It was also your word against theirs and guess which one would be believed? You walked a fine line. Not to mention that it was very easy to get too used to prison and forget what life was like outside and make plans for the future. When your day consists of getting through to the next one you lose sight of any goals you might have had. You also get caught up in prison life: the people, the work, whatever you do to entertain yourself or keep in shape. This was an incredible book that really lays it all out there. Most of these women in prison are there for non-violent drug related charges. Some are there for a minor probation violation. This book shows that America needs to revamp it's justice system in the way that it sentences prisoners for drug related crimes because we have prisons that are overflowing with people that are what we deem to be undesirable. Also, we need to have education and treatment available for those that want to better themselves or get off drugs. And to better prepare them for the world after prison, such as how to get housing, aid, and a job. Kerman writes passionately on this subject as she has lived it herself and was lucky to not have to leave prison without a job waiting for her or an apartment set up for her to live in. Kerman learns a lot from her prison stint about the harm her time with Nora did to others as well as herself and whether or not she can let go of her hatred of Nora for naming her and putting her in prison in the first place. This is a must read book.

Quotes

July dawned with a sour flavor. The entire Camp facility seemed to groan in the heat, overtaxed. The phones stopped working. The washing machines broke, a horror show. Suddenly all the hair dryers disappeared. Two hundred women, no phones, no washing machines, no hair dryers—it was like Lord of the Flies on estrogen. I sure as hell wasn’t going to be Piggy.