March 2026 Newsletter

Every year, I celebrate March 4th as if it's my birthday, because in some ways, it is my birthday. 21 years ago on March 4th, I walked out of prison for the first time, and walked back into the world as somebody who had earned a lot of new names. Felon, a name I earned when I carjacked a man. Convict, a name I earned over the eight and a half years I spent in prison. Ex-con, the name I earned by walking out of prison, a free man. Shahid, the name I chose because I’d begun to understand that a name can be a future and I wanted to carry one that reminded me that the lives around me mattered.

Thinking of leaving prison always makes me remember all it took to thrive there. Because, quiet as kept, amidst the chaos and violence and sorrow, there is thriving. Sister Sonia Sanchez taught me some of that. Her Under a Soprano Sky was the first book I purchased with my money. And I carried it around with me for years. I’d been introduced to her work when someone slid the Black Poets under my cell and reading her poetry was like listening to Whitney Houston sing "I Want to Dance With Somebody," which is to say that it made me feel loved and as if love was a thing necessary for survival, and not the violence I’d always been incapable of conjuring with my fists.

Once, someone mailed me a dozen of her poems, all cut out into pieces to save postage weight. When I opened the envelope, the poems fell as if pieces of a puzzle. And they were. A pathway to hold onto more than anger, and be willing to cut to the quick, through the noise, and see the world both as it is and as it might be.

Years later, once free, she’d visit my hometown and folks organizing the reading where she’d do her thing asked for volunteers to pick her up. Though I’d just gotten out of prison and just gotten my license and there was no GPS, I volunteered. I promptly got us lost. And all I remember her saying was Dear brother, you’ll get us there. And finally I did. Imagine someone who wrote words that saved your life speaking confidence into the disaster that you’d turned a routine trip from the train into.

Freedom Reads is a way for me to pay homage to the generosity I’ve experienced in this world. It’s a way to say I know freedom begins with a book because of how free I felt, even for just a few moments at a time, when someone wrote the words into existence that created space for me. If you agree, please consider donating to Freedom Reads and giving your favorite book written by a woman to a stranger one day this month!

Based on his NAACP Image Award–winning poetry collection FELON, the performance explores incarceration, fatherhood, identity, and the role of literature in confronting harm and imagining freedom.

The March 4th performance marks 21 years since Betts’ release from prison.

On March 18th, we announced the five National Book Award–honored books that hundreds of incarcerated readers will evaluate as judges for the 2026 Inside Literary Prize. Click below to read more about this year’s Prize.

By James Davis III, Communications Associate, Freedom Reads

Since when do funders help do the work of going into prisons to bring Freedom Libraries Inside?

I mean help as in lifting heavy boxes to sort the thousands of books that live on the beautifully handcrafted bookshelves that Freedom Reads is founded upon. But that is just what happened at California Medical Facility (CMF), staff and supporters, together, opening Freedom Libraries for the sick and injured prisoners of CMF.

By Jason Dorsey, Guest Blog Contributor

Every other Wednesday, twenty of us chained and rustled like cattle, formed a motley crew. Destination; courthouse basement. We waited in bullpens, (large holding cells), as if in purgatory drowning in sweat, uncertainty, and fear. Not quite hell, not quite hope. We shared cold benches, bologna sandwiches with green edges, and an unspoken understanding that most of us would not be going home. It was better left unsaid. Words were weaponized against us in the foreign language of reports and plea offers.

Jimmy Flynn is the kind of person who shows up with his hands, his heart, and his whole self. As a Library Production Associate at Freedom Reads, Jimmy works in the shop each day, transforming raw wood slabs into the finished Freedom Libraries that bring powerful books to incarcerated readers. It's skilled, meaningful work, and what fuels him most is the moment those libraries are received. "Seeing the smiles of those on the inside, the joy and excitement they express from being gifted with libraries," he says, is what he enjoys most.

Each newsletter we aim to share at least one letter (or excerpt) from one of Freedom Reads now 65,000-plus Freedom Library patrons. Freedom Reads receives many letters from the Inside. They mean so much to us. And we respond to each and every one of them.

“When I saw your volunteers putting their books and curvy bookshelves in our unit, I was not particularly excited. I am, I fully admit, a book snob. I was raised on books…Then I saw the spines of some of your books, and this rush of excitement. I am writing all of this in an attempt to convey my gratitude – along with my genuine awe regarding the selection you and your team have put together.”

Leonard, Freedom Library Patron at South Woods State Prison, New Jersey

“Thank you for the wonderful show and performance by Reginald Dwayne Betts at San Quentin on March 4, 2026. It was more than I hoped for, and it certainly exceeded whatever expectation I thought was in my mind. What will stay with me about the performance was Mr. Betts and his stage presence. I felt like I was an onlooker, attending a man’s life journey, as a real-time theatrical performance. I thank the entire Freedom reads organization for its willingness to take this show on the road. What a pleasure.”

Kevin, Freedom Library Patron at San Quentin, California

We are excited to welcome four new members to our team this month! Roversy Ventura joins us as Human Resources Generalist and Executive Assistant. Ben French and Kyle Gonzalez join the Libraries team as Library Production Associate and Library Production Assistant, respectively. And Jonathan Peterson joins us as Visual Systems and Production Associate. Please join us in welcoming them to the team!

We were thrilled to be featured in two publications this month. People.com spotlighted the announcement of this year's Inside Literary Prize. We were also recognized in the Washington Industry Journal which featured our visits to Women’s Eastern Reception, Diagnostic & Correctional Center and Fulton Reception & Diagnostic Center in Missouri.