WHEN you find yourself in the hands of Corrective Services NSW, sometimes there's nothing to do but turn a new page. Start a new chapter. Rewrite your story.
Okay, we'll stop.
For many behind bars, reading is one of the only types of escape that might be encouraged. Particularly when there's a pandemic on.
Official numbers released on Tuesday seem to show that's exactly what happened: prisoners across the state checked out more books than the year before as COVID-19 dominated 2020.
There were 42,800 books withdrawn in the first nine months this year, up from 34,300 the year before.
Corrective Services NSW library services manager Rebecca Bollen Manalac said fantasy, thrillers and romance novels helped pass the time when some programs and activities had to be suspended.
"Just like in the community, it's been a challenging year for the inmates, and books have been helping them escape from the world, even if for a few hours," Ms Bollen Manalac said. "Overall men prefer fantasy and thrillers and the women are more likely to pick up a romance book - Nora Roberts and Danielle Steele are popular authors with female inmates."
Ms Bollen Manalac said there was a serious side to offering inmates a broad selection of reading material.
"While books are entertaining, they're also an important behaviour-management tool in our prisons by ensuring offenders remain engaged," she said.
"Access to books including non-fiction and legal texts is also important for their rehabilitation, improving their literacy, keeping them in touch with the world, and assisting them with skills to prepare them post-release."
For male inmates the top books were George RR Martin's A Storm of Swords, part of the saga that became HBO's Game of Thrones. It pipped Stieg Larsson's The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and Lee Child's Killing Floor, the first novel featuring Jack Reacher.
Women picked Stephen King's The Gunslinger, a fantasy novel, and Anh Do memoir The Happiest Refugee. John Grisham legal thriller The Guardians rounded out the top three for this year.
Assistant Commissioner governance and continuous improvement Carlo Scasserra said inmates had about 140,000 titles to choose from, but their choices were not entirely free.
"The texts are vetted to ensure there is no literature available to inmates that could lead to any security or safety risks, and true crime is banned," Mr Scasserra said. "Our library services staff, clerks and officers managing prison libraries have done a great job of ensuring offenders have the resources they needed during a tough year."
The list took on a slight Hunter flavour last year when the fifth-most popular book was Robert G Barrett's Crime Scene Cessnock in fifth place. What would you read in prison?
