Today the LA Review of Books has a new review essay from me about Joshua Dubler’s essential book about prison and American religion, Down in the Chapel.

It’s winter, early 2006. And in winter, Dubler has come to see, “when the wind pushes up from the valley, driving rain and snow sideways into the worn concrete of the wall’s outer shell, the prison feels suddenly like a refuge and the world outside apathetic and grim, a place for coyotes and bears, but not remotely suited for men.” There’s an accusation here, of course, because they are men who live here. And they’re taking refuge from the rest of us. We put them there.