Open Books 2024: The Justice System or IncarcerationUnpublished

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A NEW YORK TIMES TOP TEN BOOK OF THE YEAR * FINALIST FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD IN FICTION * A READ WITH JENNA BOOK CLUB PICK * NATIONAL BESTSELLER * Two top women gladiators fight for their freedom within a depraved private prison system not so far-removed from...

It is 1998 and Leonora Gelb, a recent Stanford grad, has a world of opportunity open before her. Traveling to Peru to work for an NGO, she falls into the orbit of a Marxist guerrilla group, turning the cushy world Gelb has known on its head. After a bloody government raid, Gelb is sentenced to life...

International bestseller and master storyteller Jeffrey Archer returns with a tale of fate and fortune, redemption and revenge with A Prisoner of Birth. Danny Cartwright and Spencer Craig never should have met. One evening, Danny, an East End cockney who works as a...

Special Agent Puller's brother is the country's most wanted criminal, but his conviction points to a cover-up--and a dangerous enemy bent on burying the truth in this #1 New York Times bestselling thriller. It's a prison unlike any other. Military discipline rules. Its...

Winner of the NAACP Image Award in Outstanding Graphic Novels Winner of an Alex Award from the American Library Association Winner of the Libby Award for Best Comic/Graphic Novel of the Year Finalist for the Dayton Literary Peace Prize in Nonfiction ...

"Fans of domestic suspense will adore Kimberly Belle." --Mary Kubica, New York Times bestselling author of The Good Girl From the internationally bestselling author of The Marriage Lie, a riveting story of deceit and dark truths. Humanitarian aid...

"A wise, lonely novel . . . [and an] honest reflection of exile." --The New Yorker In the tradition of Roberto Bolaño's Savage Detectives, a celebrated classic and heart-wrenching story of a family torn apart by the forces of history, by one of Latin America's most celebrated...

High-school football star Matt Barnes was on the top of the world until a freak snowboarding accident ended his promising sports career and left him with a permanent limp. As he struggles to accept his changed body, Matt becomes depressed and isolated. Instead of college football camp, he faces a...

The moving stories of children in migration--in their own words. "In Spanish and in English, a devastating first-person account of children's experiences in detention at the southern U.S. border.... A powerful, critical document only made more heartbreaking...

"Rich and complex, The Good Son is a compelling novel about the aftermath of a crime in a small, close-knit community."--Kristin Hannah, New York Times bestselling author From #1 New York Times bestselling author Jacquelyn Mitchard comes the gripping, emotionally...

In the dead of night, a Czech farm girl and a British soldier travel through the countryside. Izabela and prisoner of war Bill have secretly married and are on the run, with Izzy dressed as a man. The young husband and wife evade capture for as long as possible -- until they are cornered by Nazi...

In the aftermath of a devastating fire, a prisoner is offered one chance at redemption in this haunting supernatural suspense from the author of USA Today bestseller, The Girl With All the Gifts. Fellside is a maximum security prison on the edge of the Yorkshire...

During the 1950s, Gold Medal Books introduced authors like Jim Thompson, Chester Himes, and David Goodis to a mass readership eager for stories of lowlife and sordid crime. Today many of these writers are admired members of the literary canon, but one of the finest of them of all, Elliott Chaze,...

In this breathtaking thriller from a New York Times bestselling author, an innocent father serving life for the murder of his own son receives evidence that his child may still be alive--and must break out of prison to find out the truth.   ...

"These recipes make me smile and laugh out loud with joy, memory, and awe at their total culinary genius. All born from a bond of pure hunger?"--Samuel L. Jackson, from the Foreword When you're in prison, a little money in the commissary can mean the difference between a life of flavorless misery...

Based on the true story of an American POW during the Korean War and a North Korean soldier who become unlikely allies united in their shared faith in God during a daring escape to freedom.     When his jet malfunctions,...

*INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER* One of Barack Obama's Recommended Reads for Summer * New York Times Notable Book * NPR's Best Books of 2021 * Washington Post's Best Thriller and Mystery Books of the Year * TIME Magazine's 100 Must-Read Books...

A touching tale of parent-child separation and immigration, from a National Book Award finalist After Saya's mother is sent to an immigration detention center, Saya finds comfort in listening to her mother's warm greeting on their answering machine. To ease the distance between...

The Sisters of Reckoning is the blockbuster sequel to Charlotte Nicole Davis's alternate Old West-set fantasy adventure. The Good Luck Girls are free. Aster's sister and friends have new lives across the border in Ferron, while Aster remains in Arketta, helping more...

In this stunning debut collection, Curtis Dawkins, an MFA graduate and convicted murderer serving life without parole, takes us inside the worlds of prison and prisoners with stories that dazzle with their humor and insight, even as they describe a harsh and barren existence. In Curtis...

THE SANCTUARY is the gripping story of vigilante priest, Danny Hansen, who is now serving a fifty year prison term in California for the murder of two abusive men. Filled with remorse, Danny is determined to live out his days by a code of non-violence and maneuvers deftly within a ruthless prison...

I would like to make myself the heroine of this story and my character to be noble--an innocent victim led astray. But alas, sir, I would be lying...  In prison, accused of murder, Tully Truegood begins to write her life story. A story that takes her from a young girl in the...

Knives Out and Ocean's 8 meets The Nest in this hilariously twisty novel by award-winning author HelenKay Dimon, about a woman who returns home from prison to her dysfunctional con artist family and tries to get them to go legit. One day a con man met...

Incarcerated for his subversive connection to the old, living world, a prisoner makes the most of his isolation in this captivating allegorical tale about tyranny, conviction, and the enduring power of imagination. Upon setting out for a morning walk with his knobby stick in...

Introduction by Lorenzo Carcaterra * Nominated as one of America's best-loved novels by PBS's The Great American Read A popular bestseller since its publication in 1844, The Count of Monte Cristo is one of the great page-turning thrillers of all time....

"Dazzling. . . . A hard-won love letter to readers and to booksellers, as well as a compelling story about how we cope with pain and fear, injustice and illness. One good way is to press a beloved book into another's hands. Read The Sentence and then do just that."--USA Today, Four Stars ...

The companion to The Dead Inside, "[An] unnerving and heartrending memoir" (Publishers Weekly) This is the story of my return to high school. This is the true story of how I didn't die. High school sucks for a lot of people. High school extra sucks when you believe, deep in your...

With a white mother and a Japanese father, Koji Miyamoto quickly realises that his home in San Francisco is no longer a welcoming one after Pearl Harbor is attacked. And once he's sent to an internment camp, he learns that being half white at the camp is just as difficult as being half Japanese on...

The first memoir about the "reeducation" camps by a Uyghur woman.   "I have written what I lived. The atrocious reality." -- Gulbahar Haitiwaji to Paris Match Since 2017, more than one million Uyghurs have been deported from their homes in the...

#1 New York Times Instant Bestseller In Kristin Hannah's The Great Alone, a desperate family seeks a new beginning in the near-isolated wilderness of Alaska only to find that their unpredictable environment is less threatening than the erratic behavior found in...

Winner of the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award In this "dangerously hilarious" novel (Los Angeles Times), a trans woman reenters life on the outside after more than twenty years in a men's prison, over one consequential Fourth of July weekend--from the author of...

*WINNER OF A 2018 EDGAR AWARD FOR BEST DEBUT NOVEL* *WINNER OF AN ALEX AWARD FROM THE ALA* NAMED A BEST BOOK OF 2017 BY St. Louis Post-Dispatch * Booklist A propulsive, gritty novel about a girl marked for death who must fight and steal to stay alive, learning from the most...

When former platoon sergeant Matt Kubelsky is paroled from Ray Brook Federal Correctional Institute in upstate New York, he's surprised to find his ex-girlfriend waiting for him out in the parking lot. An ex-girlfriend he's spent years pining for after she dumped him and stopped answering his...

A powerfully moving book that "could make graspable why today's prisons are contemporary slave plantations" (Alice Walker, author of The Color Purple), giving voice to the poorest among us and laying bare the cruelty of a penal system that too often defines their lives. ...

Peter Heller, the celebrated author of the breakout best seller The Dog Stars, returns with an achingly beautiful, wildly suspenseful second novel about an artist trying to outrun his past. Jim Stegner has seen his share of violence and loss. Years ago he shot a man in a bar....

In this heart-pounding thriller, a correctional officer and an ex-cop are fleeing a hurricane--but their only hope of survival is a maximum-security prison where they face new untold dangers. Hurricane Anna: a superstorm made up of two Category 5 hurricanes coming...

A troubled young mother yearns for a shot at redemption in this heartbreaking yet hopeful story from #1 New York Times bestselling author Colleen Hoover. After serving five years in prison for a tragic mistake, Kenna Rowan returns to the town where it all went wrong, hoping...

In this major new rendition by the acclaimed translator Julie Rose, Victor Hugo's tour de force, Les Miserables, is revealed in its full unabridged glory. A favorite of readers for nearly 150 years, and the basis for one of the most beloved stage musicals ever, this stirring tale of crime,...

In the United States, the conversation about teen incarceration has moved from one extreme to another. For centuries, execution of juvenile offenders was legal. By the twenty-first century, the US Supreme Court had moved closer to banning all executions of minors, regardless of the severity of...

A New York Times Bestseller A New York Times and Washington Post Notable Book A Best of the Year Selection of NPR, Time, and O, The Oprah Magazine An Oprahâ??s Book Club Selection Longlisted for the National Book Award for Fiction Newlyweds Celestial...

What happens to a dream deferred - especially when an innocent man's life hangs in the balance? Langston Brown is running out of time and options for clearing his name and escaping death row. Wrongfully convicted of the gruesome Mother's Day Massacre, he prepares to face his death. His final hope...

A #1 New York Times BestsellerNow a Netflix original seriesWith a career, a boyfriend, and a loving family, Piper Kerman barely resembles the reckless young woman who delivered a suitcase of drug money ten years ago. But when that past catches up with her, the well-heeled Smith College alumna...

"With We Carry Their Bones, Erin Kimmerle continues to unearth the true story of the Dozier School, a tale more frightening than any fiction. In a corrupt world, her unflinching revelations are as close as we'll come to justice." -Colson Whitehead, Pulitzer-Prize Winning author...

Gecko Fosse drove the getaway car. Terence Florian ran with the worst gang in Chicago. Arjay Moran killed someone. All three boys are serving time in juvenile detention centers until they get a second chance at life in the form of Douglas Healy. A former...

In this thrilling chase narrative, a hunted being escapes certain death at breakneck speed--careening through Europe, heading blindly South. Faster and faster, escaping the assassins, our protagonist flies forward, blending into crowds, adjusting to terrains, hopping on and off ferries, always...

This Life is the debut novel by Quntos KunQuest, a longtime inmate at Angola, the infamous Louisiana State Penitentiary. This marks the appearance of a bold, distinctive new voice, one deeply inflected by hiphop, that delves into the meaning of a life spent behind bars, the human bonds...

TIME'S #1 FICTION TITLE OF THE YEAR * NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF 2018 FINALIST for the MAN BOOKER PRIZE and the NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD LONGLISTED for the ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL An instant New York...

From Tracey Lange, the New York Times bestselling author of We Are the Brennans, comes The Connellys of County Down: a story about fierce family loyalty, good intentions gone awry, and the consequences of improbable love. When Tara Connelly is released...

He's taking a dangerous path in search of his missing granddaughter--the only part of his life worth saving. Oliver Cross is fresh out of jail. His plans for the future are to live out his days in regret, back pain, and a bottle of Lone Star. But when he finds out his granddaughter,...

"A remarkable feat of literary conjuration." --Jennifer Haigh, nationally bestselling author of Mercy Street The acclaimed author of The Serpent's Gift returns with this gripping and powerful novel of healing, redemption, and love,...

Don't miss the companion book, Set Me Free CRITICS ARE RAVING ABOUT SHOW ME A SIGN Winner of the 2021 Schneider Family Book Award * NPR Best Books of 2020 * Kirkus Reviews Best Books of 2020 * School Library Journal Best Books of 2020 *...

"I have to tell you something . . . I did something bad."Ever since her best friend Molly was murdered fifteen years before, Blair Butler has returned to her small hometown in the Pocono mountains as seldom as possible. Now she has been summoned home to see her terminally ill sister one last time -...

Twelve years ago Matthew "the Rocket" Rising had it all. Married to his high school sweetheart and one of the winningest quarterbacks in the history of college football, he was the number one NFL draft pick. But on the night of the draft, he plummeted from the pinnacle of esteem. Falsely accused of...

Escape from the ordinary and break into Alcatraz, America's most famous prison! The island of Alcatraz has always been a place that's fascinated visitors, from the Native American tribes who believed it was home to evil spirits to the Spanish explorers who discovered the island....

On the morning of September 11, 2001, two planes collided with the towers of the World Trade Center in New York City. In January 2002, a group of suspected terrorists were transferred to a Naval Base in Guantanamo, Cuba. They were the first of hundreds of men who would be held there--and 40 still...

BOOKER PRIZE FINALIST * Based on a true event, this novel is "a blues song cut straight from the heart ... about the unjust death of an innocent Black man caught up in a corrupt system" (Walter Mosley, best-selling author of Devil in a Blue Dress). In Cardiff, Wales in...

"Lynette Noni is a masterful storyteller. A must-read for any fantasy lover!" -- SARAH J. MAAS, #1 New York Times Bestselling Author Seventeen-year-old Kiva Meridan has spent the last ten years fighting for survival in the notorious death prison, Zalindov, working as the prison healer. ...

Having forfeited his youth to the state prison system, Michael moved back to the only home he'd ever known. An empty shell of a man who now lived--if it could be called living--in the still vacant house of his parents in a town with one stoplight. A town that hated him. Had always hated him. And was...

Best Thriller and Mystery of the Year - Washington Post Best Thriller and Mystery of the Year - San Francisco Gate From the award-winning author of Quicksand, a gripping legal thriller that follows one woman's conflicted efforts to overturn what may be...

A thrilling sequel to the groundbreaking thriller, Widows.  After serving a lengthy sentence for the murder of her husband, Dolly Rawlins is free from prison. And she's only got one thing on her mind: the diamonds she stashed before the police caught her.

"Urgent, haunting, and fearless." --Megan Abbott, author of Beware the Woman A Barnes & Noble Mystery & Thriller Pick | An Elle Best Book of the Summer | An Apple Best Book of May | A Most Anticipated Book from BookPage, SPY, Lit Hub, and...

Russell Avery needs a story to tell. The laid-off reporter turned private investigator is almost out of clients after he stood up against the Newark police officers whose problems he used to fix for a paycheck, exposing a scandal that left him on the wrong side of one of those thin blue...

A senior federal judge's incisive, unsettling exploration of some of the paradoxes that define the judiciary today, Why the Innocent Plead Guilty and the Guilty Go Free features essays examining why innocent people plead guilty, why high-level executives aren't prosecuted, why you won't...

Set in a Mexican prison in the late 1960s, The Hole follows three inmates as they plot to sneak in drugs under the noses of their ape-like guards. The inmates desperately need to secure their next fix, and hatch a plan that involves convincing one of their mothers to bring the drugs into the...

Find out about the lives of some of the most important people in history. From campaigners for change to world leaders, this series is a perfect introduction to the men and women who have helped shape out world. Book jacket.

Power on the Inside is the first book to examine the historical development of prison gangs worldwide, from those that emerged inside mid-nineteenth-century Neapolitan prisons to the new generation of younger inmates challenging the status quo within gang subcultures today. Historian...

The great Native American Novel of a battered veteran returning home to heal his mind and spirit One of The Atlantic's Great American Novels of the Past 100 Years More than thirty-five years since its original publication, Ceremony remains...

A graphic novel memoir from Frank "Big Black" Smith, a prisoner at Attica State Prison in 1971, whose rebellion against the injustices of the prison system remains one of the bloodiest civil rights confrontations in American history. FOUR DAYS IN 1971 CHANGED THE COURSE OF...

As a teenager, Toni Murphy had a life full of typical adolescent complications: a boyfriend she adored, a younger sister she couldn't relate to, a strained relationship with her parents, and classmates who seemed hell-bent on making her life miserable. Things weren't easy, but Toni could never...

An NPR Best Book of the Year * The stunning sequel to the critically acclaimed,  #1 New York Times bestseller Dear Martin. An incarcerated teen writes letters to his best friend about his experiences in the American juvenile justice system. An...

Kiki Swinson's novels crackle with breakneck triple-twists, no-limits characters, and an unforgettably brutal portrayal of Southern life. Now she shatters all expectations as a young woman serving time must survive a prisoner-abuse conspiracy... She killed her abusive boyfriend in self-defense. Now...

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER More than ONE MILLION copies sold A TODAY Show Read with Jenna Book Club Pick A New York Times Notable Book, a New York Times Readers' Choice Best Book of the Century, and Chosen by Oprah Daily, Time, NPR,...

The #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Sinner brings another hot adventure of true love and ultimate sacrifice in the Black Dagger Brotherhood world. The location of the glymera's notorious prison camp was lost after the raids. When a freak accident...

Myles's courtroom testimony should have put Pryor, their one-eyed ringleader, behind bars after the bank robbery gone wrong, yet somehow Pryor got off scot-free while Myles served time. Now, upon his release, Myles decides he is done with his life of wrongdoing--a change that will only be...

Enter a historic Nebraskan prison where three women find betrayal, love, and ultimate truth. Jane Prescott is serving a ten-year sentence for murder. Can a broken spirit be healed behind bars? Matron Mamie Dawson feels called to help the wounded women in her charge. Will a guard’s...

What happens when you've been betrayed by those closest to you?When ex-con and novelist JA Kingsley loses everything he ever cared about, including his wife and teenage daughter, he abandons his home in order to start anew, write a new book, and most of all, restart his fractured life....