https://simplecast.com The Freedom Takes The Freedom Takes is a podcast from the Freedom Reads, produced for listeners in prison and out, that explores the relationship between literature and freedom. Freedom Reads was founded in the knowledge that in a world with prison cells, freedom can begin with a book. And in a country with two million people incarcerated, the offer of a million books to provide solace, affirm dignity, enable imaginative escape and bridge human differences is a duty. So we are sending tens of thousands of books into prisons and juvenile detention centers across this country. On the show, poet, lawyer, and founder of Freedom Reads, Reginald Dwayne Betts talks to some of the authors of these books about their lives as writers and as readers, and about what it means to them to be free. 2020-present en Thu, 10 Jul 2025 13:00:00 +0000 Thu, 10 Jul 2025 13:00:11 +0000 https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com The Freedom Takes https://image.simplecastcdn.com/images/ac6133f3-8afa-4ecd-a499-1677ca2d77d9/e46b6b56-6f5f-439f-8e0b-987a8f7dc58e/3000x3000/the-freedom-takes.jpg?aid=rss_feed https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com episodic The Freedom Takes is a podcast from the Freedom Reads, produced for listeners in prison and out, that explores the relationship between literature and freedom. Freedom Reads was founded in the knowledge that in a world with prison cells, freedom can begin with a book. And in a country with two million people incarcerated, the offer of a million books to provide solace, affirm dignity, enable imaginative escape and bridge human differences is a duty. So we are sending tens of thousands of books into prisons and juvenile detention centers across this country. On the show, poet, lawyer, and founder of Freedom Reads, Reginald Dwayne Betts talks to some of the authors of these books about their lives as writers and as readers, and about what it means to them to be free. Freedom Reads true https://feeds.simplecast.com/xmPkMGYl the freedom takes, criminal justice, fiction, mass incarceration, freedom, becoming, books, criminal justice reform, literature, reading, million book project, reginald dwayne betts, poetry Freedom Reads media@freedomreads.org 16e7c9ba-1fe5-4abf-8481-9c420cf5e89d Inside Literary Prize 2025: Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah In today’s episode, Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah sits down with Freedom Reads Founder & CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts and Steven Parkhurst, Communications Manager at Freedom Reads. Adjei-Brenyah reads from his novel Chain-Gang All-Stars, which was shortlisted for the 2025 Inside Literary Prize, the first major US literary prize awarded exclusively by incarcerated judges. Chain-Gang All-Stars takes place in an imagined future where people serving life sentences can opt-in to gladiatorial death matches in an attempt to gain their freedom. Loretta Thurwar and Hurricane Staxxx are lovers and fan favorites, and as they compete, they are forced to confront the brutal spectacle they’ve become a part of. Adjei-Brenyah delves into the idea of the prison system as a failure of imagination and reflects on the seven years he spent writing this novel. This conversation is discerning; it attempts to answer the hard questions, to understand desperation and the necessity of forgiveness. Adjei-Brenyah is sharp and curious in his consideration of what reading means for freedom. 

Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah is a National Book Foundation “5 under 35” honoree and the author of Friday Black and Chain-Gang All-Stars. His Friday Black collection won the PEN/Jean Stein Book Award and the William Saroyan International Prize for Writing.  His debut novel, Chain-Gang All-Stars, was a finalist for the National Book Award for Fiction and selected as a New York Times Top 10 Book of the Year. He currently lives in the Bronx. 

]]> Thu, 10 Jul 2025 13:00:00 +0000 media@freedomreads.org (Reginald Dwayne Betts, Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, Steven Parkhurst, Sasha Rotko, Tyler Sperrazza, Madeline Sklar) https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com/episodes/inside-literary-prize-2025-nana-kwame-adjei-brenyah-vmezxZja In today’s episode, Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah sits down with Freedom Reads Founder & CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts and Steven Parkhurst, Communications Manager at Freedom Reads. Adjei-Brenyah reads from his novel Chain-Gang All-Stars, which was shortlisted for the 2025 Inside Literary Prize, the first major US literary prize awarded exclusively by incarcerated judges. Chain-Gang All-Stars takes place in an imagined future where people serving life sentences can opt-in to gladiatorial death matches in an attempt to gain their freedom. Loretta Thurwar and Hurricane Staxxx are lovers and fan favorites, and as they compete, they are forced to confront the brutal spectacle they’ve become a part of. Adjei-Brenyah delves into the idea of the prison system as a failure of imagination and reflects on the seven years he spent writing this novel. This conversation is discerning; it attempts to answer the hard questions, to understand desperation and the necessity of forgiveness. Adjei-Brenyah is sharp and curious in his consideration of what reading means for freedom. 

Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah is a National Book Foundation “5 under 35” honoree and the author of Friday Black and Chain-Gang All-Stars. His Friday Black collection won the PEN/Jean Stein Book Award and the William Saroyan International Prize for Writing.  His debut novel, Chain-Gang All-Stars, was a finalist for the National Book Award for Fiction and selected as a New York Times Top 10 Book of the Year. He currently lives in the Bronx. 

]]> Inside Literary Prize 2025: Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah Reginald Dwayne Betts, Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, Steven Parkhurst, Sasha Rotko, Tyler Sperrazza, Madeline Sklar 00:42:56 In today’s episode, Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah sits down with Freedom Reads Founder & CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts and Steven Parkhurst, Communications Manager at Freedom Reads. Adjei-Brenyah reads from his novel Chain-Gang All-Stars, which was shortlisted for the 2025 Inside Literary Prize, the first major US literary prize awarded exclusively by incarcerated judges. Chain-Gang All-Stars takes place in an imagined future where people serving life sentences can opt-in to gladiatorial death matches in an attempt to gain their freedom. Loretta Thurwar and Hurricane Staxxx are lovers and fan favorites, and as they compete, they are forced to confront the brutal spectacle they’ve become a part of. Adjei-Brenyah delves into the idea of the prison system as a failure of imagination and reflects on the seven years he spent writing this novel. This conversation is discerning; it attempts to answer the hard questions, to understand desperation and the necessity of forgiveness. Adjei-Brenyah is sharp and curious in his consideration of what reading means for freedom. In today’s episode, Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah sits down with Freedom Reads Founder & CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts and Steven Parkhurst, Communications Manager at Freedom Reads. Adjei-Brenyah reads from his novel Chain-Gang All-Stars, which was shortlisted for the 2025 Inside Literary Prize, the first major US literary prize awarded exclusively by incarcerated judges. Chain-Gang All-Stars takes place in an imagined future where people serving life sentences can opt-in to gladiatorial death matches in an attempt to gain their freedom. Loretta Thurwar and Hurricane Staxxx are lovers and fan favorites, and as they compete, they are forced to confront the brutal spectacle they’ve become a part of. Adjei-Brenyah delves into the idea of the prison system as a failure of imagination and reflects on the seven years he spent writing this novel. This conversation is discerning; it attempts to answer the hard questions, to understand desperation and the necessity of forgiveness. Adjei-Brenyah is sharp and curious in his consideration of what reading means for freedom. incarceration, the freedom takes, million book project, books, penal system, mass incarceration, freedom reads, freedom, frederick douglass, prison, chain-gang all-stars, inside literary prize true full 13 2d4db22d-f838-4eb6-9dda-d7d584111d28 Inside Literary Prize 2025: Paul Harding In today’s episode, author Paul Harding sits down with Freedom Reads Founder & CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts and Allie Salazar Gonzales, Development Manager at Freedom Reads. Harding reads from his novel This Other Eden, which was shortlisted for the 2025 Inside Literary Prize, the first major US literary prize awarded exclusively by incarcerated judges. This Other Eden takes place on Apple Island, where the Honey family, descended from the formerly-enslaved Benjamin Honey, has lived for generations alongside Irish immigrants and other people trying to create a new home for themselves. Based on the real story of Malaga Island off the coast of Maine, Paul vividly captures the beauty of this island community and its struggle against forced displacement by mainland officials. In this episode, Harding explores the idea of writing into a literary canon and shares his intentions behind the sentence-level construction of his novel. Harding reflects on the process of writing, creating characters, and, of course, what reading means for freedom.

Paul is the author of three novels, Tinkers, Enon and This Other Eden. Tinkers won the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Paul has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and PEN America. He has taught at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, the Michener Center for Writers, and Harvard University. He is currently a distinguished professor of creative writing at Emerson College in Boston. 

]]> Wed, 9 Jul 2025 13:00:00 +0000 media@freedomreads.org (Reginald Dwayne Betts, Paul Harding, Allie Salazar Gonzalez, Sasha Rotko, Tyler Sperrazza, Madeline Sklar) https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com/episodes/inside-literary-prize-2025-paul-harding-27I_FUKU In today’s episode, author Paul Harding sits down with Freedom Reads Founder & CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts and Allie Salazar Gonzales, Development Manager at Freedom Reads. Harding reads from his novel This Other Eden, which was shortlisted for the 2025 Inside Literary Prize, the first major US literary prize awarded exclusively by incarcerated judges. This Other Eden takes place on Apple Island, where the Honey family, descended from the formerly-enslaved Benjamin Honey, has lived for generations alongside Irish immigrants and other people trying to create a new home for themselves. Based on the real story of Malaga Island off the coast of Maine, Paul vividly captures the beauty of this island community and its struggle against forced displacement by mainland officials. In this episode, Harding explores the idea of writing into a literary canon and shares his intentions behind the sentence-level construction of his novel. Harding reflects on the process of writing, creating characters, and, of course, what reading means for freedom.

Paul is the author of three novels, Tinkers, Enon and This Other Eden. Tinkers won the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Paul has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and PEN America. He has taught at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, the Michener Center for Writers, and Harvard University. He is currently a distinguished professor of creative writing at Emerson College in Boston. 

]]> Inside Literary Prize 2025: Paul Harding Reginald Dwayne Betts, Paul Harding, Allie Salazar Gonzalez, Sasha Rotko, Tyler Sperrazza, Madeline Sklar 00:49:18 In today’s episode, author Paul Harding sits down with Freedom Reads Founder & CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts and Allie Salazar Gonzales, Development Manager at Freedom Reads. Harding reads from his novel This Other Eden, which was shortlisted for the 2025 Inside Literary Prize, the first major US literary prize awarded exclusively by incarcerated judges. This Other Eden takes place on Apple Island, where the Honey family, descended from the formerly-enslaved Benjamin Honey, has lived for generations alongside Irish immigrants and other people trying to create a new home for themselves. Based on the real story of Malaga Island off the coast of Maine, Paul vividly captures the beauty of this island community and its struggle against forced displacement by mainland officials. In this episode, Harding explores the idea of writing into a literary canon and shares his intentions behind the sentence-level construction of his novel. Harding reflects on the process of writing, creating characters, and, of course, what reading means for freedom. In today’s episode, author Paul Harding sits down with Freedom Reads Founder & CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts and Allie Salazar Gonzales, Development Manager at Freedom Reads. Harding reads from his novel This Other Eden, which was shortlisted for the 2025 Inside Literary Prize, the first major US literary prize awarded exclusively by incarcerated judges. This Other Eden takes place on Apple Island, where the Honey family, descended from the formerly-enslaved Benjamin Honey, has lived for generations alongside Irish immigrants and other people trying to create a new home for themselves. Based on the real story of Malaga Island off the coast of Maine, Paul vividly captures the beauty of this island community and its struggle against forced displacement by mainland officials. In this episode, Harding explores the idea of writing into a literary canon and shares his intentions behind the sentence-level construction of his novel. Harding reflects on the process of writing, creating characters, and, of course, what reading means for freedom. incarceration, literature, the freedom takes, books, penal system, colonialism, mass incarceration, colonization, liberation, freedom reads, this other eden, historical fiction, freedom, prison, malaga island, novel, inside literary prize true full 15 e71d4997-affa-4a36-a312-89646f07be32 Inside Literary Prize 2025: Astrid Roemer In today’s episode, Astrid Roemer sits down with Allie Salazar Gonzalez, Development Manager at Freedom Reads, and Dempsey, Resident Creative Writer at Freedom Reads. Following a reading from her novel On a Woman’s Madness, first released in 1982 and translated from Dutch by Lucy Scott, Roemer talks about feminism and the power of her words. On a Woman’s Madness was shortlisted for the 2025 Inside Literary Prize, the first major US literary prize awarded exclusively by incarcerated judges. The novel follows Noenka, a Black, queer, woman in Suriname as she seeks freedom from an abusive marriage. Through relationships with Ramses, her male lover, and an older woman named Gabrielle, Noenka explores her deepest desires and liberates herself from societal expectations of women.

Astrid Roemer is the author of many novels including, On a Woman’s Madness, Off-White, DealersDochter, and more. At 19 years old, Astrid emigrated from Suriname to the Netherlands. Astrid won the P.C. Hooft Award in 2016 and the Dutch Literature Prize in 2021. Originally published in Dutch in 1982, On a Woman’s Madness was translated into English by Lucy Scott and shortlisted for the National Book Award for Translated Literature in 2023. On a Woman’s Madness was recently longlisted for the International Booker Prize 2025.

]]> Tue, 8 Jul 2025 13:00:00 +0000 media@freedomreads.org (Allie Salazar Gonzalez, Astrid Roemer, Dempsey, Reginald Dwayne Betts, Sasha Rotko, Tyler Sperrazza, Madeline Sklar) https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com/episodes/inside-literary-prize-2025-astrid-roemer-Md8yf8Y_ In today’s episode, Astrid Roemer sits down with Allie Salazar Gonzalez, Development Manager at Freedom Reads, and Dempsey, Resident Creative Writer at Freedom Reads. Following a reading from her novel On a Woman’s Madness, first released in 1982 and translated from Dutch by Lucy Scott, Roemer talks about feminism and the power of her words. On a Woman’s Madness was shortlisted for the 2025 Inside Literary Prize, the first major US literary prize awarded exclusively by incarcerated judges. The novel follows Noenka, a Black, queer, woman in Suriname as she seeks freedom from an abusive marriage. Through relationships with Ramses, her male lover, and an older woman named Gabrielle, Noenka explores her deepest desires and liberates herself from societal expectations of women.

Astrid Roemer is the author of many novels including, On a Woman’s Madness, Off-White, DealersDochter, and more. At 19 years old, Astrid emigrated from Suriname to the Netherlands. Astrid won the P.C. Hooft Award in 2016 and the Dutch Literature Prize in 2021. Originally published in Dutch in 1982, On a Woman’s Madness was translated into English by Lucy Scott and shortlisted for the National Book Award for Translated Literature in 2023. On a Woman’s Madness was recently longlisted for the International Booker Prize 2025.

]]> Inside Literary Prize 2025: Astrid Roemer Allie Salazar Gonzalez, Astrid Roemer, Dempsey, Reginald Dwayne Betts, Sasha Rotko, Tyler Sperrazza, Madeline Sklar 00:40:33 In today’s episode, Astrid Roemer sits down with Allie Salazar Gonzalez, Development Manager at Freedom Reads, and Dempsey, Resident Creative Writer at Freedom Reads. Following a reading from her novel On a Woman’s Madness, first released in 1982 and translated from Dutch by Lucy Scott, Roemer talks about feminism and the power of her words. On a Woman’s Madness was shortlisted for the 2025 Inside Literary Prize, the first major US literary prize awarded exclusively by incarcerated judges. The novel follows Noenka, a Black, queer, woman in Suriname as she seeks freedom from an abusive marriage. Through relationships with Ramses, her male lover, and an older woman named Gabrielle, Noenka explores her deepest desires and liberates herself from societal expectations of women. In today’s episode, Astrid Roemer sits down with Allie Salazar Gonzalez, Development Manager at Freedom Reads, and Dempsey, Resident Creative Writer at Freedom Reads. Following a reading from her novel On a Woman’s Madness, first released in 1982 and translated from Dutch by Lucy Scott, Roemer talks about feminism and the power of her words. On a Woman’s Madness was shortlisted for the 2025 Inside Literary Prize, the first major US literary prize awarded exclusively by incarcerated judges. The novel follows Noenka, a Black, queer, woman in Suriname as she seeks freedom from an abusive marriage. Through relationships with Ramses, her male lover, and an older woman named Gabrielle, Noenka explores her deepest desires and liberates herself from societal expectations of women. incarceration, literature, women, the freedom takes, books, mass incarceration, astrid roemer, freedom reads, freedom, feminism, prison, on a woman's madness, netherlands, holland, novel, inside literary prize true full 14 9eba551c-256a-41c5-8b23-134a12dfe40e Inside Literary Prize 2025: Justin Torres In today’s episode, Justin Torres sits down with Freedom Reads Founder & CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts and David Perez DeHoyos, Library Coordination Manager at Freedom Reads. Torres reads from his novel Blackouts which was shortlisted for the 2025 Inside Literary Prize, the first major US literary prize awarded exclusively by incarcerated judges. Blackouts captures an ongoing conversation between Juan Gay and the narrator, Nene, exploring the suppression of queer history through this dialogue and blackout poems, created by redacting the two volumes of Sex Variants: A Study of Homosexual Patterns. This is a conversation about re-humanizing in the face of the dehumanization that occurs in places like prison. Torres delves into how life informed his writing and how writing has informed his life, and with characteristic poignancy, he considers the intersection of reading and freedom.

Justin Torres is a National Book Foundation 5 under 35 honoree and the author of two novels, We the Animals and Blackouts. We the Animals won the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award and was adapted into a feature film.  Blackouts won the 2023 National Book Award for Fiction, was a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Lambda Literary Award, and the Southern California Book Award. Justin was a 2024 Guggenheim Fellow, and has also received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Radcliffe Institute at Harvard University, and the New York Public Library’s Cullman Center. He is currently an Associate Professor of English at UCLA. 

]]> Mon, 7 Jul 2025 13:00:00 +0000 media@freedomreads.org (Reginald Dwayne Betts, Justin Torres, David Perez DeHoyos, Sasha Rotko, Tyler Sperrazza, Madeline Sklar) https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com/episodes/inside-literary-prize-2025-justin-torres-Mw3Jdyt4 In today’s episode, Justin Torres sits down with Freedom Reads Founder & CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts and David Perez DeHoyos, Library Coordination Manager at Freedom Reads. Torres reads from his novel Blackouts which was shortlisted for the 2025 Inside Literary Prize, the first major US literary prize awarded exclusively by incarcerated judges. Blackouts captures an ongoing conversation between Juan Gay and the narrator, Nene, exploring the suppression of queer history through this dialogue and blackout poems, created by redacting the two volumes of Sex Variants: A Study of Homosexual Patterns. This is a conversation about re-humanizing in the face of the dehumanization that occurs in places like prison. Torres delves into how life informed his writing and how writing has informed his life, and with characteristic poignancy, he considers the intersection of reading and freedom.

Justin Torres is a National Book Foundation 5 under 35 honoree and the author of two novels, We the Animals and Blackouts. We the Animals won the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award and was adapted into a feature film.  Blackouts won the 2023 National Book Award for Fiction, was a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Lambda Literary Award, and the Southern California Book Award. Justin was a 2024 Guggenheim Fellow, and has also received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Radcliffe Institute at Harvard University, and the New York Public Library’s Cullman Center. He is currently an Associate Professor of English at UCLA. 

]]> Inside Literary Prize 2025: Justin Torres Reginald Dwayne Betts, Justin Torres, David Perez DeHoyos, Sasha Rotko, Tyler Sperrazza, Madeline Sklar 00:48:31 In today’s episode, Justin Torres sits down with Freedom Reads Founder & CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts and David Perez DeHoyos, Library Coordination Manager at Freedom Reads. Torres reads from his novel Blackouts which was shortlisted for the 2025 Inside Literary Prize, the first major US literary prize awarded exclusively by incarcerated judges. Blackouts captures an ongoing conversation between Juan Gay and the narrator, Nene, exploring the suppression of queer history through this dialogue and blackout poems, created by redacting the two volumes of Sex Variants: A Study of Homosexual Patterns. This is a conversation about re-humanizing in the face of the dehumanization that occurs in places like prison. Torres delves into how life informed his writing and how writing has informed his life, and with characteristic poignancy, he considers the intersection of reading and freedom. In today’s episode, Justin Torres sits down with Freedom Reads Founder & CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts and David Perez DeHoyos, Library Coordination Manager at Freedom Reads. Torres reads from his novel Blackouts which was shortlisted for the 2025 Inside Literary Prize, the first major US literary prize awarded exclusively by incarcerated judges. Blackouts captures an ongoing conversation between Juan Gay and the narrator, Nene, exploring the suppression of queer history through this dialogue and blackout poems, created by redacting the two volumes of Sex Variants: A Study of Homosexual Patterns. This is a conversation about re-humanizing in the face of the dehumanization that occurs in places like prison. Torres delves into how life informed his writing and how writing has informed his life, and with characteristic poignancy, he considers the intersection of reading and freedom. imprisonment, books, puerto rico, penal system, puerto rican, lgtbq, freedom reads, prison, mental health, prison system, latin american, queer, mental illness, inside literary prize, blackouts true full 12 e9da1f97-ff20-4448-aded-63fe0a7c3509 The Past's Presence: Jesmyn Ward In today’s episode, Jesmyn Ward reads from her third novel, Sing, Unburied, Sing, which is at once a bildungsroman, a ghost story, an epic, and a road novel. In portraying the suck of Parchman Prison on the generations of one Mississippi family, Ward deftly explores how the real threat of incarceration haunts these psyches and, in turn, these familial relationships. In this moving conversation, Ward reflects on living with grief, on listening for communications from beyond our immediate reality, and on the central commitments of her work: to restore agency to the kinds of characters too often denied a voice--and to grant acceptance to the ones harder to forgive.

Author Bio: 

Jesmyn Ward is a novelist and professor of creative writing at Tulane University. She is the author of the novels Where the Line Bleeds; Salvage the Bones, which won the 2011 National Book Award; Sing, Unburied, Sing, which won the 2017 National Book Award; and of the memoir Men We Reaped, which was a finalist for a National Book Critics Circle Award. She is the editor of the anthology The Fire This Time. Ward has received the MacArthur Genius Grant, a Stegner Fellowship, a John and Renee Grisham Writers Residency, and the Strauss Living Award. She currently resides in Mississippi. 

To Learn More:

Visit us online at Freedom Reads and follow us on Twitter @million_book

]]> Mon, 26 Jul 2021 16:00:00 +0000 media@freedomreads.org (Reginald Dwayne Betts) https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com/episodes/the-pasts-presence-jesmyn-ward-YF1SkY9X In today’s episode, Jesmyn Ward reads from her third novel, Sing, Unburied, Sing, which is at once a bildungsroman, a ghost story, an epic, and a road novel. In portraying the suck of Parchman Prison on the generations of one Mississippi family, Ward deftly explores how the real threat of incarceration haunts these psyches and, in turn, these familial relationships. In this moving conversation, Ward reflects on living with grief, on listening for communications from beyond our immediate reality, and on the central commitments of her work: to restore agency to the kinds of characters too often denied a voice--and to grant acceptance to the ones harder to forgive.

Author Bio: 

Jesmyn Ward is a novelist and professor of creative writing at Tulane University. She is the author of the novels Where the Line Bleeds; Salvage the Bones, which won the 2011 National Book Award; Sing, Unburied, Sing, which won the 2017 National Book Award; and of the memoir Men We Reaped, which was a finalist for a National Book Critics Circle Award. She is the editor of the anthology The Fire This Time. Ward has received the MacArthur Genius Grant, a Stegner Fellowship, a John and Renee Grisham Writers Residency, and the Strauss Living Award. She currently resides in Mississippi. 

To Learn More:

Visit us online at Freedom Reads and follow us on Twitter @million_book

]]> The Past's Presence: Jesmyn Ward Reginald Dwayne Betts 00:39:22 In today’s episode, Jesmyn Ward reads from her third novel, Sing, Unburied, Sing, which is at once a bildungsroman, a ghost story, an epic, and a road novel. In portraying the suck of Parchman Prison on the generations of one Mississippi family, Ward deftly explores how the real threat of incarceration haunts these psyches and, in turn, these familial relationships. In this moving conversation, Ward reflects on living with grief, on listening for communications from beyond our immediate reality, and on the central commitments of her work: to restore agency to the kinds of characters too often denied a voice--and to grant acceptance to the ones harder to forgive. In today’s episode, Jesmyn Ward reads from her third novel, Sing, Unburied, Sing, which is at once a bildungsroman, a ghost story, an epic, and a road novel. In portraying the suck of Parchman Prison on the generations of one Mississippi family, Ward deftly explores how the real threat of incarceration haunts these psyches and, in turn, these familial relationships. In this moving conversation, Ward reflects on living with grief, on listening for communications from beyond our immediate reality, and on the central commitments of her work: to restore agency to the kinds of characters too often denied a voice--and to grant acceptance to the ones harder to forgive. incarceration, literature, parchman prison, racism, jesmyn ward, road novel, ghosts, characters, sing unburied sing, novel, dwayne betts, time true full 11 ba95edb6-46e1-4c79-9a2b-5fc6bec74c60 As True As I Can Write It: Erika Sánchez Our guest, Erika Sánchez, reads from her masterful debut young adult novel, I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter. Sánchez's writing is unflinching in its reckoning with teenage pain, while also somehow making you laugh out loud. This conversation combines the same qualities, returning bravely to humor between ventures into serious terrain like the stigma attached to mental health struggles in the Latinx community, and the dark places a writer needs to go in her own mind to get despair right on the page. Sánchez reflects on a family dynamic recognizable to most of us who were once adolescents: the desire to be seen for who we are and want to be, alongside the failure to imagine the lives of our parents -- and the alienation and tension this can cause, especially for the children of immigrants. For Sánchez, reading can exacerbate the distance we feel from our kin, carrying us to a million other worlds, but it's also an exercise in revolutionary empathy -- with the potential to reconnect us, and more deeply than before.

Author Bio:  

Erika Sánchez is a poet, essayist, and novelist. She's the author of I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter, a New York Times Bestseller, a National Book Awards finalist, and a soon-to-be film adaptation directed by America Ferrera. Her poetry collection, Lessons on Expulsion, was a finalist for the PEN America Open Book Award, and her memoir, Crying in the Bathroom, is slated to be published in 2022. She was a 2017-2019 Princeton Arts Fellow, and a recipient of both the 21st Century Award from the Chicago Public Library Foundation and a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in Poetry. She was appointed the Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz Chair in the Latin American and Latino Studies Department at DePaul University and is part of the inaugural core faculty of the Randolph College Low Residency MFA Program.

]]> Wed, 23 Jun 2021 12:00:00 +0000 media@freedomreads.org (Kelly Hernandez (host), Erika Sánchez, Reginald Dwayne Betts (host)) https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com/episodes/as-true-as-i-can-write-it-erika-sanchez-z8_Mod8f Our guest, Erika Sánchez, reads from her masterful debut young adult novel, I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter. Sánchez's writing is unflinching in its reckoning with teenage pain, while also somehow making you laugh out loud. This conversation combines the same qualities, returning bravely to humor between ventures into serious terrain like the stigma attached to mental health struggles in the Latinx community, and the dark places a writer needs to go in her own mind to get despair right on the page. Sánchez reflects on a family dynamic recognizable to most of us who were once adolescents: the desire to be seen for who we are and want to be, alongside the failure to imagine the lives of our parents -- and the alienation and tension this can cause, especially for the children of immigrants. For Sánchez, reading can exacerbate the distance we feel from our kin, carrying us to a million other worlds, but it's also an exercise in revolutionary empathy -- with the potential to reconnect us, and more deeply than before.

Author Bio:  

Erika Sánchez is a poet, essayist, and novelist. She's the author of I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter, a New York Times Bestseller, a National Book Awards finalist, and a soon-to-be film adaptation directed by America Ferrera. Her poetry collection, Lessons on Expulsion, was a finalist for the PEN America Open Book Award, and her memoir, Crying in the Bathroom, is slated to be published in 2022. She was a 2017-2019 Princeton Arts Fellow, and a recipient of both the 21st Century Award from the Chicago Public Library Foundation and a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in Poetry. She was appointed the Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz Chair in the Latin American and Latino Studies Department at DePaul University and is part of the inaugural core faculty of the Randolph College Low Residency MFA Program.

]]> As True As I Can Write It: Erika Sánchez Kelly Hernandez (host), Erika Sánchez, Reginald Dwayne Betts (host) 00:33:35 Our guest, Erika Sánchez, reads from her masterful debut young adult novel, I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter. Sánchez's writing is unflinching in its reckoning with teenage pain, while also somehow making you laugh out loud. This conversation combines the same qualities, returning bravely to humor between ventures into serious terrain like the stigma attached to mental health struggles in the Latinx community, and the dark places a writer needs to go in her own mind to get despair right on the page. Sánchez reflects on a family dynamic recognizable to most of us who were once adolescents: the desire to be seen for who we are and want to be, alongside the failure to imagine the lives of our parents -- and the alienation and tension this can cause, especially for the children of immigrants. For Sánchez, reading can exacerbate the distance we feel from our kin, carrying us to a million other worlds, but it's also an exercise in revolutionary empathy -- with the potential to reconnect us, and more deeply than before. Our guest, Erika Sánchez, reads from her masterful debut young adult novel, I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter. Sánchez's writing is unflinching in its reckoning with teenage pain, while also somehow making you laugh out loud. This conversation combines the same qualities, returning bravely to humor between ventures into serious terrain like the stigma attached to mental health struggles in the Latinx community, and the dark places a writer needs to go in her own mind to get despair right on the page. Sánchez reflects on a family dynamic recognizable to most of us who were once adolescents: the desire to be seen for who we are and want to be, alongside the failure to imagine the lives of our parents -- and the alienation and tension this can cause, especially for the children of immigrants. For Sánchez, reading can exacerbate the distance we feel from our kin, carrying us to a million other worlds, but it's also an exercise in revolutionary empathy -- with the potential to reconnect us, and more deeply than before. literature, erika sanchez, i am not your perfect mexican daughter, mental health, reading, young adult novel, latinx, poetry, depression, mental illness true full 10 bf1ea3c2-ba86-49d6-b3cc-9ce34321a0fc Telling Stories of Inside: Susan Burton and Rachel Kushner Fri, 30 Apr 2021 07:00:00 +0000 media@freedomreads.org (Freedom Reads) https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com/episodes/telling-stories-of-inside-susan-burton-and-rachel-kushner-PZhMPkr6 Telling Stories of Inside: Susan Burton and Rachel Kushner Freedom Reads 00:57:23 Today's bonus episode of The Freedom Takes is a collaboration with the National Book Foundation. Over the last three years, the foundation's Literature for Justice committees have curated thought-provoking reading lists on the topic of mass incarceration. Dwayne is a former committee member and a selected author. The Foundation has partnered with Freedom Reads to send Literature for Justice titles to reading groups in prisons and juvenile detention centers nationwide. On today's episode, Dwayne returned to moderate a discussion with authors and committee members Susan Burton (Becoming Ms. Burton: From Prison to Recovery to Leading the Fight for Incarcerated Women, 2019-2020 Reading List) and Rachel Kushner (The Mars Room, 2019-2020 Reading List) in conversation on their work and the larger work of literature inside and outside of prisons to open new worlds of possibility. Today's bonus episode of The Freedom Takes is a collaboration with the National Book Foundation. Over the last three years, the foundation's Literature for Justice committees have curated thought-provoking reading lists on the topic of mass incarceration. Dwayne is a former committee member and a selected author. The Foundation has partnered with Freedom Reads to send Literature for Justice titles to reading groups in prisons and juvenile detention centers nationwide. On today's episode, Dwayne returned to moderate a discussion with authors and committee members Susan Burton (Becoming Ms. Burton: From Prison to Recovery to Leading the Fight for Incarcerated Women, 2019-2020 Reading List) and Rachel Kushner (The Mars Room, 2019-2020 Reading List) in conversation on their work and the larger work of literature inside and outside of prisons to open new worlds of possibility. true full 9 f01e151a-e386-4e7d-8320-2c13b302c61b Reclaiming Voice & Self: Randall Horton Author Bio:
Randall Horton is the author of the poetry collections#289-128, Dark Anarchy, The Definition of Place, andThe Lingua Franca of Ninth Street. His memoir,Hook, was the winner of the Great Lakes College Association New Writers Award.Horton currently a Professor of English at the University of New Haven. He’s received numerous awards, including the Gwendolyn Brooks Poetry Award, the Bea Gonzalez Poetry Award, the Great Lakes College Association New Writers Award for Creative Nonfiction, and a National Endowment of the Arts Fellowship in Literature. In 2018-2019 Randall was selected as Poet-in-Residence for the Civil Rights Corps in Washington DC, a non-profit that challenges systemic injustice in the American legal system.

 

To Learn More:

Visit us online at Freedom Reads and follow us on Twitter @million_book

]]> Fri, 23 Apr 2021 16:00:00 +0000 media@freedomreads.org (Freedom Reads) https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com/episodes/reclaiming-voice-self-randall-horton-lHBOg9LV Author Bio:
Randall Horton is the author of the poetry collections#289-128, Dark Anarchy, The Definition of Place, andThe Lingua Franca of Ninth Street. His memoir,Hook, was the winner of the Great Lakes College Association New Writers Award.Horton currently a Professor of English at the University of New Haven. He’s received numerous awards, including the Gwendolyn Brooks Poetry Award, the Bea Gonzalez Poetry Award, the Great Lakes College Association New Writers Award for Creative Nonfiction, and a National Endowment of the Arts Fellowship in Literature. In 2018-2019 Randall was selected as Poet-in-Residence for the Civil Rights Corps in Washington DC, a non-profit that challenges systemic injustice in the American legal system.

 

To Learn More:

Visit us online at Freedom Reads and follow us on Twitter @million_book

]]> Reclaiming Voice & Self: Randall Horton Freedom Reads 00:43:18 Randall Horton is the author of a memoir and four powerful poetry collections, including his most recent #289-128 – once his state Department of Corrections number, now reclaimed for his art. The collection explores the experience of imprisonment, remembers the voices and yearnings of people inside, and pushes back against hollow language about mass incarceration. On the show, he talks about the power in taking back for poetry's purposes the state number that followed and follows him, pays tribute to Etheridge Knight, shares a few secrets from his creative process and sneaks in some credit to his steadfast mom. Randall Horton is the author of a memoir and four powerful poetry collections, including his most recent #289-128 – once his state Department of Corrections number, now reclaimed for his art. The collection explores the experience of imprisonment, remembers the voices and yearnings of people inside, and pushes back against hollow language about mass incarceration. On the show, he talks about the power in taking back for poetry's purposes the state number that followed and follows him, pays tribute to Etheridge Knight, shares a few secrets from his creative process and sneaks in some credit to his steadfast mom. true full 8 3d60e9fe-2ec4-40bc-810b-47fa35523847 Shooting Baskets in Verse: Natalie Diaz Author Bio

Natalie Diaz was born and raised on the Fort Mojave Indian Village in Needles, California. She is Mojave and an enrolled member of the Gila River Indian Tribe. Her first poetry collection, When My Brother Was an Aztec, was published by Copper Canyon Press in 2012. Her most recent collection, Postcolonial Love Poem,was published by Graywolf Press in 2020. She is 2018 MacArthur Foundation Fellow, a Lannan Literary Fellow and a Native Arts Council Foundation Artist Fellow. She was awarded a Bread Loaf Fellowship, the Holmes National Poetry Prize, a Hodder Fellowship, and a PEN/Civitella Ranieri Foundation Residency, as well as a US Artists Ford Fellowship. Diaz teaches at the Arizona State University Creative Writing MFA program.

To Learn More:

Visit us online at Freedom Reads and follow us on Twitter @million_book

]]> Fri, 2 Apr 2021 15:00:00 +0000 media@freedomreads.org (elsa hardy, reginald dwayne betts) https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com/episodes/the-physicality-of-poetry-natalie-diaz-fwoLiglY Author Bio

Natalie Diaz was born and raised on the Fort Mojave Indian Village in Needles, California. She is Mojave and an enrolled member of the Gila River Indian Tribe. Her first poetry collection, When My Brother Was an Aztec, was published by Copper Canyon Press in 2012. Her most recent collection, Postcolonial Love Poem,was published by Graywolf Press in 2020. She is 2018 MacArthur Foundation Fellow, a Lannan Literary Fellow and a Native Arts Council Foundation Artist Fellow. She was awarded a Bread Loaf Fellowship, the Holmes National Poetry Prize, a Hodder Fellowship, and a PEN/Civitella Ranieri Foundation Residency, as well as a US Artists Ford Fellowship. Diaz teaches at the Arizona State University Creative Writing MFA program.

To Learn More:

Visit us online at Freedom Reads and follow us on Twitter @million_book

]]> Shooting Baskets in Verse: Natalie Diaz elsa hardy, reginald dwayne betts 00:46:15 It was a joy to have Natalie Diaz on the show, drawing vital connections between basketball, dance, poetry, discovery and love. How to let poetry belong to more people; how writing can clarify "what you mean, and what you want"; how loving is sometimes easier on the page -- these are among the themes of our conversation with Diaz. She also shares about the creation of her latest collection, Postcolonial Love Poem, touches on her private work of language revitalization, and models speaking of and from the heart. It was a joy to have Natalie Diaz on the show, drawing vital connections between basketball, dance, poetry, discovery and love. How to let poetry belong to more people; how writing can clarify "what you mean, and what you want"; how loving is sometimes easier on the page -- these are among the themes of our conversation with Diaz. She also shares about the creation of her latest collection, Postcolonial Love Poem, touches on her private work of language revitalization, and models speaking of and from the heart. incarceration, the freedom takes, million book project, dreams, basketball, poetry, natalie diaz, postcolonial love poem, poems true full 7 4e573230-0989-4942-a6d0-9cfdd7b365bc The Interior Landscapes of Church Ladies: Deesha Philyaw Author Bio:

Deesha Philyaw is an author, columnist, essayist, and public speaker.The Secret Lives of Church Ladies won the Story Prize (2020/2021), was a finalist for the 2020 National Book Award for Fiction, the 2021 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, and a 2021 LA Times Book Prize: The Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction. Her work has been listed as Notable in the Best American Essays series, and her writing on race, parenting, gender, and culture has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, McSweeney’s, The Rumpus, Brevity,  Apogee Journal, and elsewhere. Philyaw is a Kimbilio Fiction Fellow.

 

To Learn More:

Visit us online at Freedom Reads and follow us on Twitter @million_book

]]> Thu, 11 Mar 2021 15:00:00 +0000 media@freedomreads.org (deesha philyaw, reginald dwayne betts, kelly hernandez) https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com/episodes/the-interior-landscapes-of-church-ladies-deesha-philyaw-1g_HUrkb Author Bio:

Deesha Philyaw is an author, columnist, essayist, and public speaker.The Secret Lives of Church Ladies won the Story Prize (2020/2021), was a finalist for the 2020 National Book Award for Fiction, the 2021 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, and a 2021 LA Times Book Prize: The Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction. Her work has been listed as Notable in the Best American Essays series, and her writing on race, parenting, gender, and culture has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, McSweeney’s, The Rumpus, Brevity,  Apogee Journal, and elsewhere. Philyaw is a Kimbilio Fiction Fellow.

 

To Learn More:

Visit us online at Freedom Reads and follow us on Twitter @million_book

]]> The Interior Landscapes of Church Ladies: Deesha Philyaw deesha philyaw, reginald dwayne betts, kelly hernandez 00:42:18 We recorded this interview with Deesha Philyaw shortly after she found out that her debut collection of short stories, The Secret Lives of Church Ladies, had won the Story Prize (2020/2021). We spoke with her about these stories and their masterfully readable exploration of the intersection of Black women, sex, and church; writing about home when you've made home elsewhere; and how to navigate consent issues that arise when writing about your children. We recorded this interview with Deesha Philyaw shortly after she found out that her debut collection of short stories, The Secret Lives of Church Ladies, had won the Story Prize (2020/2021). We spoke with her about these stories and their masterfully readable exploration of the intersection of Black women, sex, and church; writing about home when you've made home elsewhere; and how to navigate consent issues that arise when writing about your children. short stories, the freedom takes, million book project, sex, deesha philyaw, the story prize, black women, the secret lives of church ladies, black church, church, dwayne betts, queer true full 6 b296c7e9-84b9-495c-9fa4-a33b243b07d3 The Many Ways to Tell a Story: James McBride Wed, 24 Feb 2021 15:00:00 +0000 media@freedomreads.org (james mcbride, elsa hardy, reginald dwayne betts) https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com/episodes/the-many-ways-to-tell-a-story-james-mcbride-clikS2ot The Many Ways to Tell a Story: James McBride james mcbride, elsa hardy, reginald dwayne betts 00:40:06 Celebrated author, musician, and screenwriter James McBride, speaks directly to our primary audience -- people in prison -- about moving past regret in life, finding freedom in books, claiming power in knowledge. He also offers a micro-lesson on the varying ways to tell a story -- from his piano bench. McBride is the author of a number of celebrated books, including The Good Lord Bird, which won the National Book Award for Fiction and was adapted into a limited series on Showtime starring Ethan Hawke. His other books include Deacon King Kong, Miracle at St. Anna, and The Color of Water. In 2015, he was awarded the National Humanities Medal by President Obama “for humanizing the complexities of discussing race in America.” He holds several honorary doctorates and is currently a Distinguished Writer in Residence at New York University. Celebrated author, musician, and screenwriter James McBride, speaks directly to our primary audience -- people in prison -- about moving past regret in life, finding freedom in books, claiming power in knowledge. He also offers a micro-lesson on the varying ways to tell a story -- from his piano bench. McBride is the author of a number of celebrated books, including The Good Lord Bird, which won the National Book Award for Fiction and was adapted into a limited series on Showtime starring Ethan Hawke. His other books include Deacon King Kong, Miracle at St. Anna, and The Color of Water. In 2015, he was awarded the National Humanities Medal by President Obama “for humanizing the complexities of discussing race in America.” He holds several honorary doctorates and is currently a Distinguished Writer in Residence at New York University. literature, the good lord bird, james mcbride, freedom, deacon king kong, elsa hardy, dwayne betts true full 5 d13a173b-e7a8-4f03-a1d6-4bf7eb4627b7 Perpetual Line-Crosser: Reginald Dwayne Betts When a poetry anthology was slid under young Betts' cell door 23 years ago is when the Million Book Project -- an endeavor to slide thousands of world-opening books to readers in prisons across the country -- really took root. Betts is an award-winning poet and author of several poetry collections, including Felon: Poems, Shahid Reads His Own Palm, and Bastards of the Reagan Era. His Memoir, A Question of Freedom: A Memoir of Learning, Survival, and Coming of Age in Prison was awarded the 2010 NAACP Image Award for Non-fiction. Betts also served on the Coordinating Council of the Office of Juvenile and Delinquency Prevention under President Barack Obama. He continues to work as a poet, lawyer, public speaker, and artist.  You can learn more about his work here.

]]> Wed, 10 Feb 2021 15:00:00 +0000 media@freedomreads.org (Reginald Dwayne Betts, Rion Amilcar Scott) https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com/episodes/reginald-dwayne-betts-XfAYUCae When a poetry anthology was slid under young Betts' cell door 23 years ago is when the Million Book Project -- an endeavor to slide thousands of world-opening books to readers in prisons across the country -- really took root. Betts is an award-winning poet and author of several poetry collections, including Felon: Poems, Shahid Reads His Own Palm, and Bastards of the Reagan Era. His Memoir, A Question of Freedom: A Memoir of Learning, Survival, and Coming of Age in Prison was awarded the 2010 NAACP Image Award for Non-fiction. Betts also served on the Coordinating Council of the Office of Juvenile and Delinquency Prevention under President Barack Obama. He continues to work as a poet, lawyer, public speaker, and artist.  You can learn more about his work here.

]]> Perpetual Line-Crosser: Reginald Dwayne Betts Reginald Dwayne Betts, Rion Amilcar Scott 00:28:01 Founder of the Million Book Project Reginald Dwayne Betts takes a turn as interviewee, responding to guest-host Rion Amilcar Scott about his early memories as a reader, the social currency of literature in prison, and his commitment to working on multiple fronts to get people free. Founder of the Million Book Project Reginald Dwayne Betts takes a turn as interviewee, responding to guest-host Rion Amilcar Scott about his early memories as a reader, the social currency of literature in prison, and his commitment to working on multiple fronts to get people free. becoming, literature, books, mass incarceration, reginald dwayne betts, reform, freedom, reading, poetry, felon true full 4 aeb0f533-9bc8-4db4-ad48-abd11f1ba2c8 To Leave or Stay & Fight: Miriam Toews Wed, 27 Jan 2021 15:00:00 +0000 media@freedomreads.org (Miriam Toews, Reginald Dwayne Betts, Elsa Hardy, Erin Slomski-Pritz) https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com/episodes/to-leave-or-stay-fight-miriam-toews-A9I2Zpje To Leave or Stay & Fight: Miriam Toews Miriam Toews, Reginald Dwayne Betts, Elsa Hardy, Erin Slomski-Pritz 00:39:26 Miriam Toews is the best-selling and award-winning author of eight books, including her most recent work, Women Talking -- the heartbreaking, philosophical, and funny account of female crime victims defining justice for themselves. It is both a good story, and the kind of good story that gets into the marrow of readers: the kind for which Toews is renowned. On today's show, Toews discusses the making of Women Talking, the challenges of leaving but continuing to love her former Mennonite community, and her certainty that literacy is freedom. Miriam Toews is the best-selling and award-winning author of eight books, including her most recent work, Women Talking -- the heartbreaking, philosophical, and funny account of female crime victims defining justice for themselves. It is both a good story, and the kind of good story that gets into the marrow of readers: the kind for which Toews is renowned. On today's show, Toews discusses the making of Women Talking, the challenges of leaving but continuing to love her former Mennonite community, and her certainty that literacy is freedom. incarceration, literature, the freedom takes, mennonite, freedom, frederick douglass, reading, writing, miriam toews, women talking, dwayne betts, literacy true full 3 cb8dc965-f022-4fcc-b118-d15c266a639d Inventing the Language of Cross River: Rion Amilcar Scott Wed, 13 Jan 2021 15:00:00 +0000 media@freedomreads.org (Reginald Dwayne Betts, Rion Amilcar Scott, Elsa Hardy) https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com/episodes/inventing-the-language-of-cross-river-rion-amilcar-scott-xZU15b24 Inventing the Language of Cross River: Rion Amilcar Scott Reginald Dwayne Betts, Rion Amilcar Scott, Elsa Hardy 00:32:28 Rion Amilcar Scott is an award-winning writer who turns a short story into deep glimpses inside the souls of Black folks. Over two collections of stories, Insurrections and The World Does Not Require You, Scott has created a world-- literally -- in the Cross River of his invention: a spot in Maryland where a triumphant slave rebellion led to the founding of a city. And in creating that world, he has fashioned a wild collection of indelible characters and cutting stories. Rion Amilcar Scott is an award-winning writer who turns a short story into deep glimpses inside the souls of Black folks. Over two collections of stories, Insurrections and The World Does Not Require You, Scott has created a world-- literally -- in the Cross River of his invention: a spot in Maryland where a triumphant slave rebellion led to the founding of a city. And in creating that world, he has fashioned a wild collection of indelible characters and cutting stories. short stories, mass incarceration, juba, prison, rion amilcar scott, fiction, ralph ellison, cross river, insurrections, dwayne betts true full 2 b71ad243-beef-4617-b6a3-42cf9e0ae40d No Boring Books: Jason Reynolds Our host Reginald Dwayne Betts chops it up with Jason Reynolds, a beloved author of young adult fiction and poetry. Jason has won all the prizes that dope writers get, including the Kirkus Prize and the Coretta Scott King Honor. In the inaugural episode of The Freedom Takes, Dwayne and Jason discuss their common roots in PG County, Maryland; the importance of literature in the lives of young people; and Jason’s book Long Way Down, of which Freedom Reads has sent 900 copies to readers in juvenile detention centers across the country.

Learn more about Freedom Reads, and follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn.

You can find out more about the author and his work by visiting https://www.jasonwritesbooks.com/.

 

 

 

]]> Mon, 7 Dec 2020 16:19:20 +0000 media@freedomreads.org (Jason Reynolds, Reginald Dwayne Betts) https://the-freedom-takes.simplecast.com/episodes/no-boring-books-jason-reynolds-MvqAIKJM Our host Reginald Dwayne Betts chops it up with Jason Reynolds, a beloved author of young adult fiction and poetry. Jason has won all the prizes that dope writers get, including the Kirkus Prize and the Coretta Scott King Honor. In the inaugural episode of The Freedom Takes, Dwayne and Jason discuss their common roots in PG County, Maryland; the importance of literature in the lives of young people; and Jason’s book Long Way Down, of which Freedom Reads has sent 900 copies to readers in juvenile detention centers across the country.

Learn more about Freedom Reads, and follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn.

You can find out more about the author and his work by visiting https://www.jasonwritesbooks.com/.

 

 

 

]]> No Boring Books: Jason Reynolds Jason Reynolds, Reginald Dwayne Betts 00:30:37 Our host Reginald Dwayne Betts chops it up with Jason Reynolds, a beloved author of young adult fiction and poetry. Jason has won all the prizes that dope writers get, including the Kirkus Prize and the Coretta Scott King Honor. In the inaugural episode of The Freedom Takes, Dwayne and Jason discuss their common roots in PG County, Maryland; the importance of literature in the lives of young people; and Jason’s book Long Way Down, of which Freedom Reads has sent 900 copies to readers in juvenile detention centers across the country. Our host Reginald Dwayne Betts chops it up with Jason Reynolds, a beloved author of young adult fiction and poetry. Jason has won all the prizes that dope writers get, including the Kirkus Prize and the Coretta Scott King Honor. In the inaugural episode of The Freedom Takes, Dwayne and Jason discuss their common roots in PG County, Maryland; the importance of literature in the lives of young people; and Jason’s book Long Way Down, of which Freedom Reads has sent 900 copies to readers in juvenile detention centers across the country. young adult literature, jason reynolds, reginald dwayne betts, long way down, poetry, p.g. county true full 1