How to Send Books and Magazines to an Inmate in North Carolina

INMATEAID EDITORIAL ARTICLE

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Internal links: North Carolina inmate search, send money, visitation, Staying Connected hub, North Carolina reentry resources

NOTE: Governing = NC Prisons Policy D.0100 (Publications Received/Possessed by Offenders) + D.0300 (Mail); ID = OPUS number. KEY TRAP = address: personal mail -> TextBehind, PO Box 247, Phoenix MD 21131 (scanned to tablet); publications -> prison STREET address (e.g., Central Prison, 1300 Western Blvd., Raleigh NC 27606). Format: softcover, ~11 x 8.5 x 3 in; hardcover only by facility approval if no softcover. Content review by institutional Publication Review Committee; appeal to Commissioner's Correspondence Review Committee within 10 days. Sacred texts/religious courses: chaplain pre-approval, ship direct to facility (not TextBehind). Verified against dac.nc.gov offender-mail page, mid-June 2026. Not highly volatile (TextBehind stable since 2021), but mail-digitization space is active nationally - light recheck advised.

How to Send Books and Magazines to an Inmate in North Carolina

A book is one of the best things you can put in the hands of someone you love inside a North Carolina prison. It fills the long, empty hours, it keeps the mind working, and it is a piece of the outside world they get to hold onto. North Carolina is more open than its reputation suggests, but there is one trap that sends families' packages right back, and it has to do with where you ship the book. Let me walk you through it the way someone who has done time would, plainly and without the runaround. Get the address right once and you can keep good reading flowing to your person for as long as they are inside.

Two Channels: TextBehind and the Prison

The single most important thing to understand in North Carolina is that there are two separate mailing channels, and books go to a different place than your letters.

Your personal mail no longer goes to the prison at all. Since late 2021, North Carolina sends all non-legal letters, cards, photos, and artwork to a private company called TextBehind, at a post office box in Maryland, where it is scanned and delivered to your person as a digital image on a tablet. That Maryland address is for letters only. The original paper is held briefly and then destroyed, so your person gets the words and images but not the physical card, which is worth knowing before you send anything you would want kept.

Books, magazines, and newspapers are the exception. They do not go through TextBehind. If you ship a book to the TextBehind address in Maryland, the company will return it to you, and your person never sees it. Publications go straight to the prison itself, to the institution's street address. Keep those two channels straight in your head, letters to TextBehind, books to the prison, and you have already dodged the single most common mistake families make in North Carolina.

Books: Publisher or Online Retailer

Here is the good news, straight from the state. North Carolina does not allow an individual to mail a book directly to an incarcerated person, but it does let you order one and have a seller ship it in. The Department of Adult Correction puts it plainly: you must order the publication from the publisher or from an online retailer and have it shipped to your person at the prison.

That phrase, online retailer, is the one that matters, because it means North Carolina is an Amazon-friendly state. You are not limited to the publisher and you are not limited to a short approved-vendor list. A book ordered from a major online bookseller and shipped to the facility is exactly what the state describes. The only hard rule is that it cannot look like it came from your house. It has to ship from the seller.

The reason is the same one driving the letter-scanning system. Mailrooms cannot tell a clean book from one whose pages have been soaked in drugs, so the state only trusts shipments that come sealed and straight from a recognized seller. Order the right way and the book goes through. You may have seen vendor websites claiming North Carolina locks you into one approved bookstore and charges a premium to ship through them. You do not have to use them. The state's own instructions allow any online retailer, so a correctly placed order from a major bookseller is cheaper and works just as well.

How to Order a Book the Right Way

Order a book that is sold and shipped by Amazon, not a third-party marketplace seller, in new paperback. When you are on the listing, look for the words showing Amazon itself is the seller and the shipper, because a marketplace seller can look identical but ships like a private package, which is what the mailroom turns away.

Now the part that trips people up: the address. Do not use the Maryland TextBehind box. Ship the book to your person at the prison's actual street address, formatted with their full committed name and their OPUS number, then the facility name and its street address. For example, a book to someone at Central Prison goes to their name and OPUS number, Central Prison, 1300 Western Blvd., Raleigh, NC 27606. You can confirm your person's OPUS number and current facility on the North Carolina inmate search, and you can find each prison's street address on the state's facility list. Send only the book, with no card, photo, or note tucked inside, because an extra in the package can get the whole thing pulled. Send your card separately through TextBehind. Keep your order receipt in case you ever need to ask why something did not arrive. One more practical tip: confirm your person has not just transferred before you order, since people move between facilities and a book addressed to an old prison can sit or bounce. A quick check on the inmate search before you place the order saves a lost package.

Magazines and Newspapers

Magazines and newspapers follow the same logic as books. They cannot come from you directly, but you can set up a subscription that ships from the publisher or an online source straight to the prison's street address. Once it is running, each issue arrives on its own, which makes a subscription one of the steadiest and kindest things you can set up. It does not depend on you remembering to send anything, and it gives your person something to look forward to every month.

Address the subscription to your person with their OPUS number at the prison's street address, not the TextBehind box. Stick to mainstream titles, since anything built around nudity or sexual content will be rejected, and a rejected issue still burns a month of the subscription. Newspapers work the same way through a direct subscription, which is the only practical method, since clipping and forwarding articles yourself runs into the no-direct-mail rule.

Format and Size Rules

North Carolina cares about the physical object as much as the words inside it. Send new paperbacks. Softcover is the safe default, and books generally need to stay within a normal trade size, roughly eleven inches by eight and a half inches and no more than about three inches thick. Hardcovers and spiral-bound books are usually refused, since a hard cover or a metal spiral can hide contraband. Your person can sometimes get approval for a hardcover educational, legal, or religious book when no softcover version exists, but that takes a request to the facility first, so do not assume it.

There are also limits on how much your person can keep at once under the property rules, so do not ship a huge stack in one box. Send the titles that matter most, space the orders out, and treat a magazine subscription as part of the steady flow rather than something extra. If your person is in segregation, a reception center, or a county jail awaiting transfer, the limits can be tighter or books may be held, so a quick call to that facility's mailroom is worth the two minutes when you are not sure.

What Gets a Publication Rejected

Every publication coming into a North Carolina prison can be reviewed by the institution's Publication Review Committee. Most books go straight through. An item gets pulled when it runs into the content rules, which bar sexually explicit material and nudity, instructions for making weapons, drugs, or alcohol, material describing escape or how to defeat security, content that incites violence or racial hatred, gang material, and anything written in code. The committee is supposed to look at the specific content rather than reject a whole title out of hand.

If a publication is disapproved, your person and the sender are notified in writing, and there is an appeal to the Commissioner's Correspondence Review Committee, which must be filed within ten days of the notice. So if something you sent is wrongly refused, do not just eat the loss. Ask for the written reason and use the appeal. Most families, when a single title is a problem, simply pick a different book, but the right to appeal is there when it matters.

Religious Texts and Study Courses

One special case worth knowing. Sacred texts and religious correspondence-course materials are handled separately and cannot go through TextBehind. If your person wants a Bible-study course or a sacred text, they first submit a request to the facility chaplain to get the course or text pre-approved, and then the material is shipped directly from the vendor or religious organization to the prison. If your person is asking for a religious study program, have them start with the chaplain rather than ordering it cold, or it can be turned away.

Tablets and E-Books

North Carolina issues tablets, and your person already reads scanned mail on one, so it is worth knowing the tablet may also offer some e-books and other media. Treat it as a supplement rather than a replacement. The catalogs tend to be limited and lean on older titles, and there can be charges to read or rent. Use the tablet for what is cheap or free on it, and keep ordering the specific paperbacks your person actually wants for everything else.

The Library and Free Books

Every North Carolina prison has a library your person can use, and it is the no-cost option, so encourage them to lean on it and to request specific titles through the librarian. There are also nonprofit books-to-prisoners programs that mail free books to incarcerated people, which can be a real lifeline when money is tight, though they run on donations and work best for general reading rather than a specific new release.

For most families the most dependable mix is simple. Use a magazine subscription for steady monthly reading, order an occasional paperback when there is a specific title your person wants, and lean on the library for everything in between. We keep current pointers to programs and resources that serve North Carolina on our North Carolina reentry resources page, which is a good place to check as you go. Encourage your person to ask the librarian about titles the library does not stock, since libraries can often borrow a book that is not already on the shelf.

Get It Right the First Time

Here is the whole thing in a breath. North Carolina runs two channels, and the trap is the address. Letters go to TextBehind in Maryland, but books and magazines go to the prison's own street address. You cannot mail a book yourself, but you can order one from the publisher or an online retailer, so send a new paperback sold and shipped by Amazon, addressed with your person's OPUS number, and keep the receipt. Set up magazines as a publisher-direct subscription through InmateAid, shipped to the prison. Keep books in trade-paperback size, watch the content rules, and if anything is wrongly refused, ask for the written reason and appeal within ten days. Send sacred texts only after the chaplain approves them.

Get it right and you become the person who reliably gets good books to someone who needs them. On the inside, that means more than you can know from out here.

FAQ

**Can I mail a book to a North Carolina inmate myself?** No. North Carolina does not allow an individual to send a publication directly. You must order it from the publisher or an online retailer and have the seller ship it to your person at the prison. A package that looks like it came from your home will be returned.

**Does Amazon work for sending books to a North Carolina prison?** Yes. The state explicitly allows ordering from an online retailer, so a copy sold and shipped by Amazon, in new paperback, works well. Address it with your person's OPUS number to the prison's street address, not the TextBehind box, and look for the listing that ships and sells directly from Amazon.

**Where do I send the book, the TextBehind address or the prison?** The prison. Personal letters go to TextBehind in Maryland for scanning, but books, magazines, and newspapers go directly to the institution's street address. A book sent to the TextBehind box will be returned to you and never reach your person.

**How do I send a magazine subscription?** Set up a subscription in your person's name shipped from the publisher to the prison's street address, with their OPUS number. North Carolina allows publisher and retailer subscriptions. InmateAid can arrange a publisher-direct subscription, which is the most reliable way to keep reading coming month after month.

**Does it have to be paperback?** Send new paperbacks within a normal trade size. Hardcovers and spiral-bound books are usually refused because they can conceal contraband. Your person can sometimes get a hardcover approved for education, legal, or religious use when no softcover exists, but only by requesting it from the facility first. Used books are riskier than new ones, so when in doubt, order new.

**Why might a book get rejected?** The institution's Publication Review Committee can pull material that is sexually explicit, that instructs on weapons, drugs, alcohol, or escape, that incites violence or hatred, or that contains gang or coded content. Your person and the sender get written notice and can appeal to the Commissioner's Correspondence Review Committee within ten days.

**How do I send a Bible or other sacred text?** Sacred texts and religious study courses cannot go through TextBehind. Your person requests pre-approval from the facility chaplain first, and then the material ships directly from the vendor or religious organization to the prison. Have them start with the chaplain so it is not turned away.

[Amazon affiliate disclosure: site-level footer. NOTE: North Carolina is AMAZON-OK - book link included normally (state allows "publisher or online retailer"); magazine link included normally. KEY TRAP is the shipping address: publications go to the prison STREET address, NOT the TextBehind scanning box.]