It starts with a letter. A scanned copy of a handwritten letter, as per prison policy, typically conveys sincere gratitude followed by a list of requests.
Some ask for thrilling mystery novels about the occult or extra-terrestrials. Others ask for financial advice books and certification guides. Many of them just want composition notebooks.
Santa Rosa Correctional Institution inmate James Forte, 65, wrote to Gainesville Books to Prisoners with a specific request: almanacs.
“I need to know what’s going on in world news,” he wrote. “Did Tina Turner really pass away last year?”
Forte is one of thousands of incarcerated people from prisons and jails in Florida who request books from books to prisoner programs each year.
“Prison is a place where time stands still and life in the free world seems to roll on without inmates like myself,” Forte wrote. “We donate every book you send to us to our inmate library that at this time doesn’t have much to offer.”
On the first and third Tuesday of every month, dozens of volunteers for Gainesville Books to Prisoners gather at the Civic Media Center to sort, package and mail books to prisoners across Florida.
They store their books in a small library tucked behind homemade curtains in the CMC’s hallway. Handmade wooden shelves built into the cramped space display rows of colorful novels. The floor is filled with stacks upon stacks of books, paper bags and packaged orders waiting to be sent.
Books are an ideal way to pass the time in a dull and repetitive environment like a prison. But for many inmates, prison libraries are lacking. Books-to-prisoner programs such as this one seek to fill in the gaps.
Anya Bernhard, 28, is a volunteer for Gainesville Books To Prisoners and one of several people who worked to kickstart the program in 2021.
Since their library is sourced through donations only, the specific requests volunteers can fill are limited. Volunteers choose related works from their existing collection when a book is unavailable.
“Maybe they ask for a certain author, and we don't have the author, but we can send you a book of the same genre,” she said. “I [can] find books about sports and geology and thriller, and we can meet those requests pretty well because we have a lot of categories. But if somebody says, I want this book by James Patterson, it's less likely.”
Requests are also restricted by a practice infamous in Florida schools— book banning.
Prison book bans across the United States are extensive. According to PEN America, Florida censored around 22,000 books from prisons, the most out of all 28 states with records of the specific titles banned.
The Florida Department of Corrections policy regarding mailed books is strict. Works considered “detrimental to the security, order, or disciplinary or rehabilitative interests of any institution” are returned to the sender.
Books depicting illegal and explicit material, such as instructions on how to create weapons, road maps useful for escaping, or descriptions of physical violence and pornographic material, are strictly forbidden.
However, unlike school library bans, it’s more than just content that determines book censorship in prisons.
Depending on the institution’s policies, books with metal binding, annotations in the margins, water damage or even a hardcover all pose the risk of rejection.
“Sometimes we have to wait four to six months before receiving the books from the free book programs here in Florida. But no matter what, they ALWAYS make an inmate’s day to receive them.”Ezzial Williams
To combat the strict mailing rules, Books for Prisoners keeps it simple. Softcover copies neatly folded in a recycled paper bag are a safe bet for getting through. Even then, packages can be returned due to damage in transit or sometimes for no reason at all, Bernhard said.
She stressed the importance of books for prisoners not just on an educational scale, but also as an inspiration for bridging the gap between inmates and the outside world.
“It’s like a way to mentally travel,” Bernhard said. “It’s emblematic of so many things, like our ability to connect with each other as people and also our ability to learn and imagine what’s possible in the world.”
Ezzial Williams, 47, is an inmate at Taylor Correctional Institute who receives books from the program.
In a written message using the prison messaging platform Securus, he expressed that owning books is preferable to borrowing from the prison’s library, where they are only allowed to check out up to three books at once for two weeks.
“If you're not a voracious reader like myself, you really don't have much time at all,” Williams said. “Especially with programs throughout the day and work call. Having your own books to keep allows us to read at our leisure and study accordingly with no time frame.”
He knows several prisoners who also received books from these programs, and says they pass them down to other inmates when they finish reading.
“Sometimes we have to wait four to six months before receiving the books from the free book programs here in Florida,” Williams said. “But no matter what, they ALWAYS make an inmate’s day to receive them.”
Gainesville Books to Prisoners is not the only organization supplying books to incarcerated people. In Pensacola, Open Books operates as a nonprofit, volunteer-run bookstore with proceeds benefiting the Prison Book Project. Operating since 2000, the project sends around 10,000 books annually to Florida’s prisons.
Johnny Ardis is the bookstore’s general manager and has volunteered for the organization since his retirement in 2010.
“[Getting books to prisoners] helps the individual prisoner cope with being there,” Ardis said. “It helps them learn things and improve themselves. When they get out, they have a better chance of success in life.”
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