It’s 6pm on a Sunday when Brittany calls to tell me about the mealworms. The mealworms, she tells me, are laudatory—an honor, a reward for good behavior in this, her fifth year in what will almost certainly prove a lifetime sentence at the Ohio Reformatory for Women. I stand in the parking lot of the local nature preserve, hoist the last remaining stretch of bright blue kayak onto the roof-rack of my SUV and strap it in. On the phone, Brittany is ecstatic, explaining that this role as mea...
