How a Book Club Helps Me Find Hope Behind Bars

On a sunny afternoon last November in New York’s Sing Sing Correctional Facility, eight men, including myself, took our seats for our weekly book club meeting. We sat in a circle. Seven other regulars were missing—those living in B Block had not been released—so the discussion started without them. With only an hour and a half allotted for the group, every minute counted.

The book club had just started as a pilot program that fall. According to a 2018 article in the Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment, and Trauma, therapeutic prison models like the book club “create a climate of safety, purpose, and positive relationships, facilitating readiness to change and hope for the future.” The group has certainly provided that for us.

On that November day, our group had been reading James Garbarino’s 2018 book, “Miller’s Children: Why Giving Teenage Killers a Second Chance Matters for All of Us.” In 2012, the Supreme Court ruled in Miller v. Alabama that children serving life without parole could request hearings for possible resentencing. The book recounts Garbarino’s experiences as an expert witness on psychology. He testified at resentencing hearings about the impact of trauma on the adolescent brain and how most kids mature into responsible, empathic adults.

Michael “Haniff” Miller, 61, sat across from me in the circle. 

“So, Chapter 4: ‘Running Away from the Monster,’ talks about emerging adulthood and resilience factors,” he began. Haniff’s gray beard accentuates eyes that have seen over 30 years of incarceration. “How in the hell are people supposed to know about this stuff when prison dehumanizes them every day?” 

“He’s right,” another man, Byron Brown, responded in his distinct Arkansan accent. “I know about some of this stuff because I have a bachelor’s degree in behavioral science. If people knew about creating a supportive environment, they could apply it.” 

Everyone nodded their heads in agreement. 

“It ain’t nothin’ to listen to somebody,” finished Brown. He had recently been accepted into the prison’s master’s degree program, making this his last meeting. 

To be in this particular book club, participants must have been 25 years old or younger when they were arrested and received sentences amounting to generations behind bars—“Life without parole or death by incarceration numbers,” as another club member, Michael Tineo, has called them. Tineo, a devout Muslim who completed his master’s degree in 2020, is one of three incarcerated people who started the pilot program, along with Mujahideen Mohammed and Tayden Salahuddin Townsley. 

Like Brown, all the men in the club are engaged in various levels of higher education, from taking their first college classes to completing their master’s degrees.

Two professors from Columbia University, Noah Remnick and Geraldine Downey, were in the room with us that day. Noah—known to prison staff as Professor Tom Cruise—agreed to be part of the pilot program because of his experience teaching incarcerated people. Noah later told me he was impressed with the students who, despite extraordinarily long sentences, “were always seeking out academic advancement and community.” The experience made him think about the purpose of education. 

“At Columbia, students focus on education as a bridge to a career or power,” he said. “In prison, students who may never leave are seeking education without that type of motive.”

Geraldine, a professor who has taught psychology classes inside Sing Sing for several years, recommended “Miller’s Children.”

“The Miller v. Alabama case and this book club give me hope because I can ask a state court to review my sentence in light of that decision, which didn’t exist at the time I was sentenced,” Brown, who has life without parole, opined. “The book club is a support system and keeps me moving.”

The men use this therapeutic space to vent and confront prison culture. 

“I would never be able to talk like this in front of other people,” a man named Corey said. He has served about a third of a 100-plus year sentence he received at age 18. 

The dehumanizing aspects of prison can include stabbings, cuttings, extortion, loneliness, excessive use of force by security, and poverty. Daily politics consists of Machiavellian gossip and virtually no access to verifiable information.

As we sat in the room, another man, Jean Frantz, chimed in.

“When I read in the book about the silent victims, I saw my past actions in a new light,” Jean said. He’s served 30 years so far. “It’s our families that become victims. I’m not talking about them having to pay for phone calls, or put up with harassing officers to come and visit, or sacrificing to leave us money or send us a food package—I’m talking about the shame they carry with them because of what we’ve done. They not only do the time with us, but they are also judged by other family members and definitely judged by people in the neighborhood. They suffer the consequences without ever being convicted.” 

Kasem, who is doing life without parole, placed his hand on Jean’s shoulder. Jean continued.

“This makes me feel like a punk, but it’s okay because that reminds me I’m human,” he said. Everyone in the room broke out laughing. 

We sat smiling in that moment for an extra beat or two. The officers were going to call us back to our cells any minute, so we held on as long as we could.

ICYMI—From The Appeal

New Federal Communications Commission rules are putting the brakes on the prison telecom industry’s exploitative practices.

A law in Georgia allows prosecutors to charge people for crimes they never committed. The result, according to a prison survey by an incarcerated woman, is that many women are incarcerated for crimes committed by men or abusive partners.

A Philadelphia jail allegedly failed to give a man his insulin for six straight days. The man’s family says his treatment exemplifies how the jail treats everyone.