The Extraordinary Ordinary Prisoner: Essays From Inside America's Carceral State

From a man sentenced to life imprisonment at the age of fourteen, a collection of eloquent and passionate columns.

On June 7, 2016, an email from a prospective writer appeared in the inbox of The Crime Report, a nonprofit criminal justice news site. The last line in the message caught the editors' attention: "I realize that submissions should include more information. However, I hope you overlook that requirement in light of the fact that I am incarcerated."

Over the next three years, Jeremiah Bourgeois, then confined to the Stafford Creek Corrections Center, a mixed medium-minimum security prison for men near Aberdeen, Washington, contributed 36 columns on his own transformation from self-destructive rage to dedicated writer and on subjects such as the treatment of gay and transgender prisoners, the lack of a #MeToo movement for incarcerated women, and the hypocrisies of prison "family visitation" events.

Months after Bourgeois finally won his parole in 2019, The Crime Report is publishing this collection of Jeremiah Bourgeois's most searing and unforgettable work.