Booksmith is thrilled to host Keri Blakinger for the paperback launch of Corrections in Ink, which she will discuss with our friend and yours, author of Orange is the New Black Piper Kerman. The conversation will be moderated by Samantha Michaels, criminal justice reporter for Mother Jones. Join us!

Please note: advance sales have ended, but we will have seats available at the door. If you need tickets, we recommend you arrive at 7pm. Questions? Email [email protected].

Please note:

• Masks will be required throughout the duration of the event and capacity will be limited to allow indoor distancing. Protocols are subject to change.
• Because we’re limiting capacity, we can't guarantee we'll have space for walk-ins. The best way to ensure you’ll get a seat is to order the Book + Seat ticket through this link.
• We are happy to offer *signed copies* of Corrections in Ink: order a Book + Seat ticket bundle if you'd like to pick up a signed copy at the event, or order here if you just want a signed copy and no admission.
• You can order Orange is the New Black by Piper Kerman here.
• If we feel it is not safe to gather, as the event gets closer, we will pivot to a virtual event and your registration will remain valid.
• Questions? Write [email protected].

About the book

Keri Blakinger always lived life at full throttle. Growing up, that meant throwing herself into competitive figure skating with an all-consuming passion that led her to nationals. But when her skating career suddenly fell apart, that meant diving into self-destruction with the intensity she once saved for the ice.

For the next nine years, Keri ricocheted from one dark place to the next: living on the streets, selling drugs and sex, and shooting up between classes all while trying to hold herself together enough to finish her degree at Cornell. Then, on a cold day during her senior year, the police caught her walking down the street with a Tupperware full of heroin.

Her arrest made the front page of the local news and landed her behind bars for nearly two years. There, in the Twilight Zone of New York’s jails and prisons, Keri grappled with the wreckage of her missteps and mistakes as she sobered up and searched for a better path. Along the way, she met women from all walks of life—who were all struggling through the same upside-down world of corrections. As the days ticked by, Keri came to understand how broken the justice system is and who that brokenness hurts the most.

After she walked out of her cell for the last time, Keri became a reporter dedicated to exposing our flawed prisons as only an insider could. Written with searing intensity, unflinching honesty, and shocks of humor, Corrections in Ink uncovers that dark, brutal system that affects us all. Not just a story about getting out and getting off drugs, this galvanizing memoir is about the power of second chances; about who our society throws away and who we allow to reach for redemption—and how they reach for it.

About the authors

Keri Blakinger is a reporter who covers criminal justice and injustice. She is currently on staff at the Los Angeles Times and has previously worked for The Marshall Project and the Houston Chronicle. Her writing has appeared everywhere from the New York Daily News to the BBC and from VICE to The New York Times. She was a member of the Chronicle's Pulitzer-finalist team in 2018 and her 2019 coverage of women's jails for The Washington Post Magazine helped earn a National Magazine Award. Before becoming a reporter, she did prison time for a drug crime in New York. Photo by Ilana Panich-Linsman.

Piper Kerman is the author of the #1 New York Times bestselling memoir Orange is the New Black: My Year in a Woman’s Prison. Compelling, moving, and often hilarious, Orange is the New Black explores issues of friendship and family, mental illness, the uneasy relationship between prisoner and jailor, and the almost complete lack of guidance our society offers for post-prison life. The book inspired the Emmy Award-winning, critically acclaimed Netflix series of the same name. Kerman serves on the board of the Women’s Prison Association and the advisory boards of the PEN America Writing For Justice Fellowship, InsideOUT Writers, Healing Broken Circles, and JustLeadershipUSA, and has spoken at the White House and testified before the US Senate. She teaches writing classes for incarcerated people. Read more about Piper here. Photo by Michael Oppenheim.

Samantha Michaels is an investigative reporter at Mother Jones magazine in San Francisco. She writes primarily about prisons, policing, and crime, with an emphasis on exposing racism and sexism in the legal system. Her recent investigation The Mother Trap, about moms who are incarcerated for longer than their abusers, won a National Magazine Award for best video and was a finalist in the category of best reporting. Michaels’ work has also appeared in The Atlantic, Outside Online, and The Best American Magazine Writing 2021. She’s originally from the Chicago area and spent a few years working as a journalist in Myanmar and Indonesia before moving to California. Photo courtesy the author.