Orange Is the New Black: My Year in a Women's Prison Paperback – March 8, 2011

I had in the last month subscribed to Netflix, and in doing so, I had heard a lot of the hype about the new original series called Orange is the New Black. I watched the 13 episodes in a matter of a couple of days. I have to say I absolutely loved the show. I looked forward to sitting with my new Kindle and watching each new episode. It was really sad to have it come to an end so quickly because I really had enjoyed it so much. I happened to be listening to NPR one day and heard the show Fresh Air with Terri Gross. Her guest that day happened to be Piper Kerman. She is the woman who wrote this memoir of her year in a Women's Prison. I became even more intrigued with the differences that she was telling Terri about from the book to the show on Netflix. I then decided that I really wanted to hear the real story and see what it was like. I didn't hesitate to go right to Amazon.com and pick up a copy of the new paperback book Orange Is the New Black: My Year in a Women's Prison by Piper Kerman. I am very happy that I decided to get the book written by the person who actually lived the story. I will say that Netflix did an excellent job in creating a very good show that really did a super job in mixing in enough things that were for the entertainment factor of the show. It really didn't go overboard too much but just had the right mix in adding things that made the show seem like the story was really in line with Hollywood and at the same time maintaining enough parts of the truth to the real story that the book tells by the author. I am still reading it, but am going to be finishing it within the next two days and I am loving it as much as I loved watching each new show that came out. I really am hoping that Netflix will pick up the series for a second season just because it is a really different and fun show to watch. I would absolutely recommend this book as well as the Netflix original series to anyone. Piper is a very likable character in the show, and person in true life as she tells her story no holds barred. It is very interesting reading about all the wonderful women that she crossed paths with in of all places a prison. There is a lot of flat out honesty that she just tells her story with. It makes you really like her and most of the women that she became close friends with while she was in the Danbury Women's Prison of all places. It isn't like she had a great time being in prison but the way that she tells her story is very much like what I would think it would feel like if it was me who was in her place. All of the new experiences that she confronts and all the kind women who really helped her in the first few weeks of actually getting used to being in prison and the rules that she has to learn and the way that the "old timers" really did a great job in helping her in those first most terrifying early days when she got there really is very touching and extremely entertaining. I can imagine that she must have stayed in touch with some of the women who were going to be there long after she did her year, so that when it was time for mail every day, some of those incredibly kind and important women that Piper did get to know well are rewarded in getting letters from her I have to believe from time to time. Like I mentioned earlier, I would recommend this book to really anyone who enjoys reading about true life and just likes to read a good book every now and then. It really has been great to pick up at any time and plowing through a couple of chapters in one sitting. I am approaching the end of the book so I will miss it, but I have to say it is very touching and honest and entertaining. And not in the way that you would get any kind of pleasure out of someone else's unfortunate story. It is extremely hard to put down and every time I pick it up, I imagine finishing it. But I honestly like to delay the ending because it is such a great book. I think that it would be a very difficult book not to like for just about anyone. I say go ahead and grab it for the few $$ that it costs as you get your money back in the honest true story that must have been very hard for Piper to write and remember that year she spent in Danbury when she actually sat down to write the book.I have a younger sister who held the job of a Prison Guard, and I don't understand why she became entwined with that work because I have a hard time picturing the sister that I grew up with doing that kind of unpleasant work. She has since gone into the ARMY for a 5 year stay and has been out for about 8 years now and she is working as a cop in a large city. Something that wasn't expected of anyone in our family where members would pass down the badge of courage, because we didn't come from that type of a family who enjoys doing that, passing the baton on to the next member. It was just something that she ended up in as a line of work. I think mostly because of the power that she must feel when she puts on her uniform and gets into her cruiser everyday for work. She has turned into someone who I haven't known as an adult since she came back from Afghanistan and it has been hard to come to terms with the type of person that she has turned into. To know how she has become a very different person than the girl that I grew up with is extremely hard to deal with because I had never pictured her becoming the type of person that she has truly become. I think that it bothers me because I try to figure out what it was that turned her in the direction that she took because we had the same upper middle class life growing up with two parents who truly loved us and that she could come from such a "normal" family and choose to mix with the dark side of prison, then being in the ARMY, and now being a cop. But that is a whole other story itself. I just want to say that I am truly enjoying this book and would definitely recommend it to anyone who is looking for something that is a fast and easy book to read! Happy reading if you decide to get it. I hope that this review will help you lean towards buying it! Enjoy!

This book/author does a great job of setting up the experiences before she got to prison. She is the first to point out that she is a privileged white woman thus recognizing the added burden of being a person of color and/or poor and/or lesser to no education. The story is engrossing and yet can be candid, comical and irreverent while still be a serious author.I like the details of day to day experience and we get a rough idea of what it would be like to be in prison, something you'd never have any clue about until you actually have experienced it. There's a mild lull about 3/4 of the way through but she pulls us through and comes around the bend redeeming the story and the author.Hearing the realities also caused me to appreciate the multiple and daily luxuries that we take for granted. That is, closing a door to shower, access to quality food superior to what sounds like the equivalent or less of a grade school cafeteria. Being able to select clothes that fit us, being able to purchase a radio, however cheap and inefficient, whenever you want and not having to wait until you can pay $25 or $50 for items in the commissary that are quadrupled in price. However there is no other way to get/have those items other than purchasing them from the prison supply (if it even gets restocked every again) AND relying on family and friends to send money into your account otherwise no deal, you are out of luck and must endure living a life of minimalism that is forced upon you.Finally, what I find so intriguing is that it ALL revolves around the personality of the person who is currently in charge and available at that moment. Knowing that one guard enjoys playing a power trip on ppl, while another may be a nice person just doing their job. It's the not knowing, the unexpected that can keep up a level of perpetual anxiety. And forget it if you lose yourself for a moment and give some attitude or don't answer in a way that is deemed sufficient, you risk going to solitary, an experience every prisoner treaded like no other.HIGHLY recommened. It's not 5 stars just because of the lull in the 2nd half of the book that was short lived.