when the (other) book comes together, it's a beautiful thing

Those of you who personally know me (or who have followed my work) know that, in addition to working with China Martens on Don't Leave Your Friends Behind, I've been furiously working on a second edition of Resistance Behind Bars: The Struggles Of Incarcerated Women to come out on PM Press in Fall 2012. It's been hard going at times: searching for new statistics on the number of women in prison who experience specific types of atrocities(like being shackled during childbirth) and realizing just how far we have to go to make such injustices obsolete. It's also had its hopeful moments, like when I find a new (to me and probably to the rest of the world) story of women resisting and successfully forcing prison systems to treat them like humans deserving of dignity.

And then, when I see movements emerging from these individual acts of organizing and resistance, I get really excited and impassioned all over again.

This weekend, I had the honor of sitting with members of Women on the Rise Telling HerStory to discuss and record their experiences at the recent convening of the Formerly Incarcerated and Convicted People's Movement to include in my second edition. These women's stories are amazing and I am honored that they share them with me.

The next day, I got an e-mail from former political prisoner, prison justice advocate, writer/editor and amazing all-around person Laura Whitehorn letting me know that she had finished writing the introduction to my second edition!

This book is also coming together and, yes, it too is a beautiful thing.

Now back to transcribing that group interview.