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It’s hard to believe that it’s already been a year since my children’s book White Flour came out.  A year and two days, actually.  Putting out a book or a CD is, in some ways, like having a child.  It goes out into the world and has its own adventures, some of which you witness, some you hear about later, and some you never know about. It builds its own relationships and, if it is embraced, it grows past you. That has certainly happened with this book, and it has been a joy to watch (if you haven’t had a chance to read it, you can check it out here).

Looking back at that year, I’m amazed by the adventures it has had. Patch Adams and Peter Yarrow (of Peter Paul & Mary) have sent kind words of support. I have a photo of Congressman and Civil Rights hero John Lewis holding the book and smiling. Legendary nonviolence theorists like Gene Sharp and Johann Galtung, who are lesser known to the general public but whose work I’ve studied and cited in papers, have written me letters saying how much they like the book. A friend even sent a note to Desmond Tutu about it, and he wrote back enthusiastically.

I began to get an inkling of how this was going to go when the kickstarter campaign blew so far past its original goal. Strangely, that support and excitement hasn’t slowed down much, even a year into the book’s life. That was followed by national media coverage on the Thom Hartmann Show, Atlanta’s CBS Evening news, some wonderful newspaper stories and radio interviews across the country.

By far the most wonderful thing that has happened, though, was on November 10 in Charlotte, NC, when neo-Nazis holding an anti-immigration rally were met by counter-protesters in full clown regalia, chanting ‘white flour!’ and ‘wife power!’ Folks from the Latino Coalition in Charlotte had encountered White Flour and base their real-life protest on it. The rally was in rotation for about 24 hours on CNN, and I heard from people all over the U.S. wondering if I had been involved. The cool part is that I wasn’t. Life was imitating art, which had begun by imitating life.

Since then we’ve added free lesson plans that teachers can download for use in English classes and Sunday School classes, with a Social Studies resource to be added soon. I’ve also been invited into classrooms, both in person and via Skype, to read the book and lead some discussion about the story and about nonviolence in general.

The book made it to the final round of twelve books under consideration for the Jane Addams Book Award, and though it didn’t win in the end, I’m thrilled that it came so close. It has also been adapted and performed by a theatrical poetry troupe in Arkansas and a group of TESOL students who performed it at an international competition in London.  In the last couple of months, Southern Poverty Law Center referenced the book and quoted me in an article on the Charlotte rally in their Quarterly Report magazine, and it was featured as a Staff Pick in Teaching Tolerance Magazine.

And what’s next? I keep thinking that the book should slow down soon, but it doesn’t seem to be doing so. I can only guess what adventure awaits.

What I do know is that the stories we tell matter.  A good and true story can shift our hearts, open our minds and inspire action. I always smile to myself when I hear people say ‘don’t just talk, do something!’ Talking is doing something, and it very often leads to doing more. Thanks for caring about this book and the story it tells. Here’s to a good story, here’s to the Knoxville clowns who inspired this one, and here’s to those who march on.

David

 

I got a note in my e-mailbox this morning from Peter Yarrow of Peter, Paul and Mary, that included these words:

White Flour is a story that needs to be told, especially in the world of today. Children need to learn how to meet the hate surrounding us without returning it – and this book shows them a special way to do that. It is a poignant and beautiful book with a story that will inspire young and old. My hat is off to David and Jenn for their important, moving, work.

That was pretty wonderful to read, especially from someone with so many years in the struggle for a better world (not to mention the writer of Puff the Magic Dragon!).  Thank you, Peter, both for the kindness and for the light you shine.

That followed on receiving a letter in the mail a couple of days ago from Gene Sharp, one of the world’s most prominent theorists on non-violence, a Nobel Peace Prize nominee and founder/director of the Albert Einstein Institution, who wrote:

White Flour is well-written and creative, and communicates an important message to young children.

Gene Sharp is responsible for teaching the principles and practice of non-violence to people all over the world, and is widely credited with educating the activists who brought about the Arab Spring.

It’s affirming to have so much positive feedback on the book. I made the book because I agree with Peter that this is a story that needs to be told, and it’s wonderful to find that some of my heroes ‘get it’, and feel the same way.

These cool notes come on the heels of a beautiful letter from Patch Adams, the famed clown activist whom Robin Williams portrayed in the movie by the same name. He wrote:

White Flour is a brilliant children’s picture book to help open up a discussion of working for peace and justice and making it fun and meaningful. It confirms that clowning is a trick to get love close.

This is a good adventure. Thanks for spreading the word, and for celebrating with me.

David

Update : A little while after posting this, I got the picture above of Congressman and Civil Rights hero John Lewis holding White Flour. Activist and long-time friend of mine Will Stone gave it to him, and he was excited to hear this story of “nonviolence in action,” as he put it.  I met John Lewis a few years ago, before I had put the book out, and I will always remember him saying “Dr. King used to say to me, sometime you have to turn the world upside down in order to set it right.”  The point of that, I think, is that peacemaking is not about achieving placidity. Rep. Lewis also said “Conflict is not always a bad thing. Sometimes conflict is necessary on the way to justice.” The question for us, as peacemakers, is how we approach conflict—in ways that are destructive or ways that are constructive?

Needless to say, it is wonderful to feel respected by people I respect so deeply.

 

 

 

 

Here’s video of David performing his poem ‘White Flour’ during a concert at Oglethorpe Presbyterian Church in Atlanta, Georgia, early in 2012.

 

The slideshow photo is of Brad, the floor manager at the warehouse, with four of the seven skids of books that arrived today—10,867 copies of White Flour, and about 2500 of S.S. Bathtub, my earlier children’s book, now back in print.  As I was arriving home from Thailand, the books were pulling in on an eighteen-wheeler.  In spite of a thirty-plus-hour trip home, I had to go by the warehouse before I went home.

Taking the very first copy of the book out of the box…

We’ll be working hard to get the original 800-plus copies of the book that were pre-ordered out to folks in the next week or two.  New copies can be ordered at www.whiteflourbook.com.

Thanks for sharing in the excitement!

David

Welcome to the new web site here at whiteflourbook.com.  There’s been so much happening with the new book that we decided it needed it’s own web site.

White Flour is an illustrated book for middle school-aged children and up, written by David LaMotte and illustrated by Jenn Hales. It tells a story, inspired by true events, of the day the Ku Klux Klan met the Coup Clutz Clowns, and humor vanquished hatred.

If you are interested in learning more about the book, please feel free to explore the web site.

If you are media, and are interested in covering the book, please click on ‘press room’ above, which offers various resources for you.

If you would like to buy the book, either in physical or eBook format, please click ‘store.’

Thank you for your interest in the book!  The ‘buzz’ and enthusiasm about it thus far has been truly overwhelming, and I’m profoundly grateful.

Best,

David