Season 2 of Orange is the New Black premieres on Netflix at midnight on June 6, so in honor of this auspicious occasion, I've assembled some reading lists inspired by the show and its characters. If you're anything like me, you'll have Season 2 wrapped up by Monday morning, so you'll have plenty of free time for reading while you wait for Season 3.
As always, the New York Public Library has you covered with a really excellently curated reading list for the show. This includes all titles that characters are seen reading, or are explicitly referenced in the show. As a librarian, Tastyee has to be my favorite character, as she works in the prison library, and her thoughts on Ulysses ("Ain't nobody got time for that") is a highlight of Season 1.
Books of Orange is the New Black ("Because Piper Chapman is the new Rory Gilmore") is a nice Tumblr of books referenced on the show. It veers into fan site territory, but it's truly impressive how many people have taken the time to pause an episode in order to inventory the books on Alex's shelves. This is probably the best site for those specifically interested in the books adjacent to the lesbian characters and relationships on the show. If you don't love Alex, then there really isn't much here for you.
BuzzFeed has a very sloppy and GIF-heavy round-up of "All of the Books Referenced on 'Orange is the New Black'." Definitely the place to go if you want visual evidence of the books mentioned on the other sites, but it is BuzzFeed, so consider yourself warned.
It's not available yet, but an official 'Orange is the New Black' cookbook will be released in the fall of 2014 by Abrams Books. That sounds disgusting, but when I read Piper Kerman's memoir, I was really curious about all of the bizarre recipes she mentions (prison cheesecake?), especially because everything had to be prepared in a microwave.
Finally, I can't write a post on the series 'Orange is the New Black' without recommending Piper Kerman's memoir by the same name that inspired the show. The series is only very loosely based on the real story, and if anything Piper has just become an audience stand-in to get us into the world occupied by significantly more compelling and diverse characters, which the real Piper Kerman has admitted was always the plan. That doesn't mean the her memoir isn't interesting and compelling, but just don't expect it to perfectly align with the series. It's a quick and easy read, and would make for a good vacation book this summer.