2025: Book written about or by one or more current or former prisoners
Book recommendations/suggestions for the Read, Seed, Water, Feed 2025 book challenge. Find your next book!
read, seed, water, feed book challenge - about prompt support posts
about prompt support posts
All of the prompt support posts (those that begin with "2025: Book written by...", for example) are organized similar to each other.
Each of these posts was created to support the Read, Seed, Water Feed book challenge on Storygraph that I am hosting. They were also created to support learning outside of the university, collective educational efforts, finding new authors to read, finding books, and more.
For each book challenge prompt, I will share the following sections:
- one or more slides with books I have read or am currently reading that I recommend for the prompt
- a list of additional books from my TBR (to-be-read) list for the prompt
- a text listing of the books that I shared in the slides
I might share one or more of the following in addition, depending on capacity and other factors:
- other supportive text as appropriate, such as countries included
- some quotes, notes, and/or reflections about one or more of the books
- links to other posts on the site where I discuss the books or prompt in more detail
I did many things to minimize hierarchy within these posts, and there will still be some things that might feel odd, such as split galleries of slides, which was a choice made to address current limitations in how the galleries work.
If interested, find bingo cards, more background on the prompts, and other reflections, on the Reading Challenge page and if on Storygraph, join the challenge.
Mostly, my goal for prompt support posts is to share books for each prompt, as suggestions and as examples. This section will be first on every post and may be skipped.
Thank you for reading.
Recommended Books
Books I've read or am currently reading that I recommend for this prompt.
Read, Seed, Water, Feed 2025 reading challenge prompt and description, showing books recommended that I have read or am currently reading. All recommended books are listed lower in the post in the section “Recommended Books in a List.”
More Books from my TBR List
For some prompts, I’m trying to diversify what I read; for others, deepening my knowledge while also growing my perspective. For some prompts, there are definitely more books on my to-be-read (TBR) list than the ones I share that I have read or am currently reading. Here are some of those books:
Essays
- Blood in My Eye (1972) by George L. Jackson
Nonfiction
- Angels with Dirty Faces: Three Stories of Crime, Prison, and Redemption (2016) Walidah Imarisha
- If They Come in the Morning … (1971) by Angela Y. Davis
- Maroon the Implacable: The Collected Writings of Russell Maroon Shoatz (2013) by Russell Maroon Shoatz
Memoirs
- Just Five Minutes Nine Years in The Prisons of Syria (1995) by Heba Dabbagh
- Live from Death Row (1995) by Mumia Abu-Jamal
- Resistance: My Life for Lebanon (2003) by Souha Bechara, Translated by Gabe Levine
- Revolution in These Times: Black Panther Party Veteran Dhoruba Bin Wahad on Antifascism, Black Liberation, and a Culture of Resistance (2025) by Dhoruba Bin Wahad, edited by Kalonji Jama Changa
- A Soldier's Story: Revolutionary Writings by a New Afrikan Anarchist (2001) by Kuwasi Balagoon
Autobiography
- Angela Davis: An Autobiography (1974) by Angela Y. Davis
repeated notes..
The book can be fiction or nonfiction.
A fictional book can be about the experiences of prisoners and the carceral system within an anti-carceral narrative and may reference current or former prisoners rather than be generally about a specific prisoner(s).
Recommended Books in a List
As a list, books I've read or am currently reading that I recommend for this prompt:
Essays
Writing on the Wall: Selected Prison Writings of Mumia Abu-Jamal (2015) by Mumia Abu-Jamal
Nonfiction
By the Fire We Carry: The Generations-Long Fight for Justice on Native Land (2024) by Rebecca Nagle
Tip of the Spear: Black Radicalism, Prison Repression, and the Long Attica Revolt (2023) by Orisanmi Burton
War Against All Puerto Ricans: Revolution and Terror in America's Colony (2015) by Nelson A. Denis
Memoirs
Big Black: Stand at Attica (2020) by Améziane, Frank "Big Black" Smith, Jared Reinmuth
The Brother You Choose: Paul Coates and Eddie Conway Talk about Life, Politics, and the Revolution (2020) by Susie Day
Don't Forget Us Here : Lost and Found at Guantánamo (2021) by Mansoor Adayfi
The War Before: The True Life Story of Becoming a Black Panther, Keeping the Faith in Prison & Fighting for Those Left Behind (2010) by Safiya Bukhari
Prison letters
Soledad Brother: The Prison Letters of George Jackson (1970) by George L. Jackson
Autobiographies
Assata: An Autobiography (1987) by Assata Shakur
Between Torture and Resistance (2012) by Oscar Lopez Rivera
Fiction
Beneath the Lion's Gaze (2010) by Maaza Mengiste
Chain-Gang All-Stars (2023) by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah
The Reformatory (2023) by Tananarive Due
The Thorn and the Carnation (2004) by Yahya Al-Sinwar
Get any/all of these books wherever you get your books.
Please support libraries however you can. Find out many ways to get involved in supporting libraries at Libraries for the People.
Please consider purchasing books when they are available from Workshops 4 Gaza's bookstore: Revolution in These Times (2025) by Dhoruba Bin Wahad, Soledad Brother (1970) by George L. Jackson, Tip of the Spear (2023) by Orisanmi Burton. When I share books that are available for purchase there at the time of posting, I will list them here after the link.
Thank you for reading.
