Community Partner Spotlight: Women's Prison Book Project

Milkweed Editions is an independent publisher of literary fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. Our mission is to identify, nurture, and publish transformative literature, and build an engaged community around it.

As a publisher, we join in thoughtful partnerships to “build an engaged community” around the books and authors we publish. Sometimes partners are community organizations, libraries, or independent bookstores who host readings with the authors we publish. And sometimes our partners are organizations with connections to specific communities of readers that we may not otherwise reach through bookstore, digital, library, or other traditional publishing channels. One such partner is the Women’s Prison Book Project, based here in Minneapolis and serving readers across the nation.

Together, Milkweed staff carried books up to their cozy half-library, half-mailroom to officially meet their volunteer-based team. It is exactly as one would expect a well-loved passion project to look and smell like. Used, worn books lined the walls according to genre. Various types of paper (book pages, letters, envelopes) lent a crafty-yet-literary aroma lingering among the towers of USPS carrier boxes. In the back, a small but powerful group of volunteers huddled over a craft table crowded with stationery and postage stamps.

Katie Hill, our Vice President engagement here at Milkweed, waved a friendly hello, navigating our little wagon of books amongst the book stacks and cardboard boxes. At our clamber, the designated lead volunteer bounded over, brandishing an armful of paper and craft scissors, excited at the sight of us. “You caught us just in time,” she explains, handing us pamphlets. “We’re trying to meet our goal for the Valentine book sends.”

As she explains their latest endeavor, the volunteers pop their heads up one at a time, curious of their visitors. Spotting the logo along our books’ spines—our signature butterfly—a surge of excitement rippled from the group. “Milkweed, at Open Book? I take my kids there all the time,” one volunteer said. “Over the years, I’ve taken my family to all the different events at Open Book. We love Milkweed.”

For Katie, this is resonant confirmation that what we do here matters, not just for our host of authors and readers alike, but for the communities all around us—whether they are close to home, an event away, or a little farther, just out of reach. Alongside the Women’s Prison Book Project, we can bring community a little bit closer, one book or letter at a time.

We offered up our cart of books—selected according to often-rigid prison guidelines—to the tune of a collective cheer in the back. As one volunteer tells us, nodding approvingly as they thumb through the bounty, “you’d be surprised how many ask for romance.”

Per the strictly-enforced rules of each prison, we carefully pooled together covers that evoked tranquility and reprieve—stories that held glimmers of the world outside. Between the Valentine cards, requests, and the sheer joy emanating from the group around us, it’s hard not to feel pulled into action. No matter the form it takes—cutting out Valentine cards, writing messages, or assembling packages—they always welcome those willing to help. “We could always use more sets of hands, writing letters for our penpal project,” the lead volunteer encourages, waving her stash of envelopes. “It’s a great way to keep these women connected to the world, even with something as simple as a handwritten note, or a book of poetry.”

As a publisher, we sometimes find ourselves with more copies of books than we need for our distribution channels. As a nonprofit, we are committed to expanding the impact of our books by ensuring they reach a wide and diverse audience of readers. When we learned of the Women’s Prison Book Project, we were grateful to find that our books could fill some of the gaps in their inventory—specifically with respect to poetry titles. We began donating books published by Milkweed to this organization in 2024 and remain committed to continuing this partnership to ensure poetry and LGBTQ+ related books are available to the readers they serve.

Since 1994, the Women’s Prison Book Project (WPBP) has provided women, trans, and gender expansive people in prison with free reading materials covering a wide range of topics from law and education (dictionaries, GED, etc.) to fiction, politics, history, and health. They are an all-volunteer, grassroots organization. They seek to build connections with those behind the walls, and to educate those of us on the outside about the realities of prison and the justice system. Learn more about this organization here.