Book Review: ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK by Piper Kerman

FACTS ABOUT THE BOOK

Title: ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK - My time in a women's prison
Author: Piper Kerman
Publisher: Little Brown
Price: £8.99

Pages: 344
Genre: Retelling/Memoir
Year: 2013

BACK OF THE BOOK

With her career, live-in boyfriend and loving family, Piper Kerman barely resembles the rebellious young woman who got mixed up with drug runners and delivered a suitcase of drug money to Europe over a decade ago. But when she least expects it, her reckless past catches up with her; convicted and sentenced to fifteen months at an infamous women's prison in Connecticut, Piper becomes inmate #11187-424. From her first strip search to her final release, she learns to navigate this strange world with its arbitrary rules and codes, its unpredictable, even dangerous relationships. She meets women from all walks of life, who surprise her with tokens of generosity, hard truths and simple acts of acceptance.

Now an original comedy-drama series from Netflix, Piper's story is a fascinating, heartbreaking and often hilarious insight into life on the inside.

MY OPINION/THOUGHTS ON IT

I (binge-)watched all currently available seasons of ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK on Netflix and am VERY excited for the new season that will get released tomorrow *-* ! This review may contain spoilers for the five seasons that are already out on Netflix and I strongly recommend to you to watch them - because it's an extremely amazing show.

So as a fan of the show I was aware of the book that it was based on but was always a bit skeptical about it. I knew that the real Piper was still married to Larry and since I ship the hell out of Piper and Alex in the series, I didn't really want to read a story in which they wouldn't be endgame. 

However, after I've sucked the fifth season into me in only two days, I was in desperate need of more ORANGE. And so I ordered this book. I specifically chose the one with the cover of the show on it but now in hindsight I should have probably rather ordered the US version with the show's cover on it instead of the UK's version, because UK spines always get ugly, and US spines don't.

But nevermind all of that. I didn't read the book last year and wasn't sure whether I should pick it up after having watched the sixth season or beforehand. I decided to read it before as a sort of "preparation" for the show. I started watching the show when there were already three seasons released so I could binge-watch so much right away. And getting only one new season a year feels quite few in comparison to my beginnings with OITNB, so I really liked the idea of getting a bit more out of the experience. And I can definitely say that this book got me even more excited for the return of the show than I already was before. *-*

If I had to use one word to describe the whole book, I think I'd choose "interesting". And not in that "I'm in lack of other words so I'll just use 'interesting'"-way but rather meaning that I really got a lot of interesting and thought-provoking information out of this reading experience that I will definitely be thinking about for a while. The fact that this isn't fictional as the show is, but rather something that actually happened to the author gives the whole book a very different tone. It's definitely a lot less entertaining than the series and a lot more "could this happen to me? and what would I do in that situation?" 

The book is made out of very long chapters that all have a title. I definitely like chapter titles because they just make starting a new chapter that bit more thrilling, but I'm definitely not a lover of long chapters. Short chapters are just such a treat for my reading speed because I always think that I can definitely still read this one more chapter and that one more... while with OITNB, the chapter length was definitely way too long and would have certainly led to me taking a much longer time to get through the book if I hadn't read it outside where I just read very quickly in general.

I really loved that the book gave me the feeling of the series. I also wanted to "binge-read" it because I felt like every new chapter was a new episode and also, to be honest, because I desperately wanted it to feel like the show. If you've seen the show, you know that while Piper starts out as being the clear main character, she makes room for a lot of other main characters in the run of the show. And there are also a lot of backstories of all the different inmates in the show that give a lot of depth to the different characters, which isn't the case in the book. Piper definitely tells the stories of the other inmates but it's all through her lens, through her perspective - filtered.

It was generally very interesting to learn about all the changes that the writers of the series made when they adapted this book for Netflix. To know what actually happened and what the show did with that reality and how it basically formed an alternate reality for Piper is very fascinating and I imagine that it also must be quite strange but fascinating for Piper herself - to see herself not just serving time in prison and then getting back to her husband Larry, but to see herself having different relationships and actually splitting up from Larry and getting engaged with the woman that brought her into all of that mess. 

Speaking of Alex. ;) (I actually hate that smiley so much but forgive me for using it this once.)

Alex is called Nora in the book and plays a very different role in there than she does in the series. I must admit that I really missed her in the book since she is not present in it for about 75% of the time, while Alex already appears at the end of the first episode in the series.

I definitely appreciate it a lot that Netflix chose to alternate the original story so drastically and gave Alex so much screentime and Piper and Alex this chemistry and love affair and bond and everything that we proudly ship in "Vauseman". I have now found out that the real Alex/Nora, who is actually called Cleary Wolters, has also published a book of her version of the events which is called OUT OF ORANGE and which I'm debating over reading at the moment.

Mostly, the series added to the story in the book, but there are also things in the book that the show left out. And one of those things was that Piper actually had to wait five years before she finally ended up in prison while knowing all those years that she eventually would. I found that to be an extremely shocking thought - to know for so many years that everything that you do doesn't actually make much sense because you will end up in prison any day anyway. 

As in the series, there are also LOTS of side characters in the book. Piper talks about many of her fellow inmates and I was always trying to figure out which inmate from the series was based on which inmate from the book, but didn't always succeed. And sometimes there was a bit much detail and maybe also too many names because it was definitely hard to keep track sometimes of who was who now. 

I don't know why, but the author repeated some things unnecessarily, when she had just mentioned them only a few pages before. This startled me a bit because it felt a bit as if the author didn't expect the reader to still know the fact although she had just mentioned it. 

The show OITNB is often referred to as "the lesbian prison show" and I proudly call it that aswell because I definitely enjoy that part of the show a lot. Hence I was definitely disappointed in the lack of lesbianism in the book. Although book/real Piper actually identified as a lesbian before she met Larry - while show Piper did not as far as I'm concerned - there was way too few mention of it in the book. Starting with the fact that it took me as a reader a while to even understand that Piper actually identified as a lesbian in the beginning of the book - she definitely talked very vaguely about her own sexuality and it seemed as if she was also not too comfortable in talking about it - maybe also because the book is dedicated to her husband Larry and that felt weird? 

I was also disappointed that she seemed to always tease the lesbianism but never deliver on it. This might make me sound like a horny man who's into lesbian sex but when you watch the show you know that lesbian sex and also sex in general is a vital part of the show. And the book just lacked a lot in that. The guards were always described to scream around that lesbian sex was forbidden and made it seem like it was all around in the prison, but the book never actually gave lesbians any voice or place in the book and also degraded a lot of women as "gay for the stay".

CONCLUSION

I read the book in preparation for OITNB's 6th season and wanted it to make me even more excited for the show's return and it definitely did that. It was also a very interesting, thought-provoking read and it was very interesting for me as a fan of the show to learn about the differences and changes that the show made from its source material. The book also gave me a lot of insight into the prison system in the USA and felt a lot more daunting at times than the show does. Although it also didn't show some of the cruelties that the show does, so I would say the show is actually a lot more brutal and violent. But since Piper is the clear main character throughout the whole book while she isn't really in the centre of the show in all seasons, I think it still felt more real in the book.. The show is definitely a much better entertainment as it was also created for that purpose, while the book is an interesting read that gives insight into a real story that happened. 

I definitely prefer the show over the book but am still very glad I read the book and would also definitely recommend it to other OITNB fans and also in general to everyone who is interested in the topic of women's prisons in the USA.

RATING

I award this book with 4 out of 5 stars.