National non-profit Freedom Reads facilitates Inside Literary Prize book discussions, voting, and author events at Instituto de Bellas Artes, Instituto 501, and Complejo Rehabilitación para las Mujeres
The national non-profit Freedom Reads facilitated Inside Literary Prize book discussions, voting, and author events for the second annual Inside Literary Prize at Instituto de Bellas Artes, Instituto 501, and Complejo Rehabilitación para las Mujeres in Puerto Rico this week.
Launched in 2023 by Freedom Reads, the National Book Foundation, and the Center for Justice Innovation with support from Lori Feathers, the Inside Literary Prize is the first-ever US-based literary prize awarded exclusively by currently incarcerated people. 25 incarcerated readers across Instituto de Bellas Artes, Instituto 501, and Complejo Rehabilitación para las Mujeres are serving as judges for the 2025 Prize, casting their ballots this week for one of this year’s four shortlisted books – Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, This Other Eden by Paul Harding, On a Woman’s Madness by Astrid Roemer, and Blackouts by Justin Torres. The winner of the 2025 Prize will be announced this July.
As part of the Inside Literary Prize events, Lemon Anderson, author of County of Kings, joined Freedom Reads inside the prisons for a reading, Q&A, and book signing. The Freedom Reads team completed Inside Literary Prize tour stops in Illinois, Connecticut, New Jersey, and California earlier this spring, and will be visiting additional prisons across Ohio and Connecticut this month to bring the Inside Literary Prize to all 300 incarcerated judges.
“At Freedom Reads, we believe that books are essential when you want to imagine a new life for yourself,” said Freedom Reads Founder & CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts. “We are overjoyed to bring the Inside Literary Prize to Puerto Rico to honor and elevate the voices of individuals Inside. Throughout this tour, we’ve seen how these four books have sparked not only intense discussion and debate, but also deep understanding and a sense of community. We are grateful to the Puerto Rico Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation for partnering with us on this important endeavor, and look forward to continuing our work together in the years ahead.”
"We are deeply grateful to Freedom Reads for considering the correctional population of Puerto Rico to make history in the literary field," said Carlos J. Delgado Cornier, Program Manager at the Puerto Rico Department of Correction and Rehabilitation. "We are aware of the power that reading holds and that through books, we achieve effective rehabilitation for individuals under the custody of the DCR. We are very pleased with such a meaningful project, and you can always count on the Department of Correction and Rehabilitation."
“As a Puerto Rican, I am thrilled that the Inside Literary Prize is being hosted in Puerto Rico,” said Freedom Reads Library Coordination Manager David Perez DeHoyos. “This prize is so important because it connects incarcerated folks on the island with the same literature being read by incarcerated judges across five other states, reinforcing that we cannot have a national conversation about books without including Puerto Rico. The world is eager to hear what these esteemed incarcerated judges have to say about the shortlist!”
About the Inside Literary Prize
In 2023, Freedom Reads, the National Book Foundation, and the Center for Justice Innovation, with support from literary podcaster Lori Feathers, announced the launch of the Inside Literary Prize, the first-ever US-based literary prize awarded exclusively by currently incarcerated people. The Prize is awarded each year to one of four shortlisted books by a jury of 300 incarcerated readers from prisons across the nation. This initiative seeks to honor the insights incarcerated readers add to cultural conversations and expand access to our country’s most thought-provoking literature for people who are incarcerated.