Reading Behind Bars, Jill Grunenwald

Jill’s story of how during the ugly recession, no job and bills to pay, drove her and her master’s degree to seek and acquire a job as a prison librarian. It’s not a maximum security prison, though minimum-security prison is nothing to sneeze at either. As green as you can be on your first day, she goes in to detail on the day-to-day life as a librarian having to deal with prisoners, the humanity in everyone, and inner strength she never knew she had. Not a real page turner, and skimmed a few pages…a quick read. It made sense that she never felt vulnerable or that afraid because the Library was a prisoner’s was a sanctuary, an inner sanctum and privilege that no one dared to screw up. Books are the one thing that made time in the joint move forward.