Orange is the New Black: My Year in a Women’s Prison After hearing my friends rave about the Netflix series, I was beyond surprised when I saw “Orange is the New Black” as a nonfiction title under the list of AP Lang books. I never knew it was a true story, so having the opportunity to actually read this book, even as an assignment, really intrigued me. “Orange is the New Black” is a memoir with a storytelling tone in a first person perspective by Piper Kerman about the 15 months she spent in prison. After graduating, Piper was an experimental and audacious adrenaline junkie craving adventure for her newfound freedom in the world. On her search, she ends up dating a lesbian drug dealer and launders illegal drug money, which lands Piper in an all women’s prison. …show more content…
To commemorate her growth and experiences, Kerman wrote a “coming-of-age” memoir, detailing her own character development and reminiscing her many reckless, but necessary, mistakes. Kerman refers to her past self as “...a careless and ignorant young girl, launching [herself] into trouble so deep that it put [her] on this prison gravel…”(143). This book is intended to help young women struggling to find themselves amongst social norms and to serve as a tool to educate readers about the realities of prison. “Orange is the New Black” effectively fulfills its purpose by telling Kerman’s story - which she considers as “a crash course on the realities of the world, how ugly things can get and how important it is to stay true to yourself...”(17) - from start to