Cleary Wolters is the real-life inspiration for the character Nora Jansen in Piper Kerman's memoir and Alex Vause in the Netflix series Orange Is the New Black. Piper spent thirteen months in a Danbury, Connecticut, minimum-security prison beginning in 2004. Cleary, meanwhile, was charged with conspiracy to import heroin and served almost six years in a Dublin, California, prison before being paroled in 2008. Cleary has written poetry, fiction, and screenplays, the bulk of which were written during her prison sentence. This is her first memoir.
A powerful, surprising memoir about crime and punishment, friendship and marriage, and a life caught in the ruinous drug trade and beyond. -- Publishers Weekly It's a riveting tale, told well and full of lessons for those willing to listen. ... detailed here in a voice that is heartfelt and honest, toughening when it needs to but remaining steadfast. -- Eloise Kinney, Booklist Don't mistake Wolters's sticking to the facts for lack of engrossing intrigue. Anecdotes about her globetrotting and law-breaking--not to mention her affair with Kerman--make for can't-put-it-down entertainment. -- Next Magazine Wolters's accessible and honest memoir opens the door and invites readers in. Patrons won't meet Alex Vause, the sultry drug-trafficking queen of OITNB. Instead, they'll meet Wolters--a woman with aspirations, whose missteps take her on unexpected journeys. -- Library Journal Where Piper's account has given us a voyeuristic look at prison life that allows us as a nation to congratulate ourselves on being so well adjusted and normal compared to the people whose lives we can't stop watching, Wolters' book sounds much more authentic, insightful, and heartbreaking. -- Tattle In [Wolter's] book, she tells an honest and emotional tale of the decisions and the mistakes she made, as well as the struggle to keep them from defining the rest of her life. -- Amos Lassen, Reviews by Amos Lassen In prose that is brilliant (at times breathtaking), Cleary also offers us a story of regret and redemption...She writes unflinchingly about her ordeals in the violent and overcrowded prison system. -- Janet Mason, Huff Post Books