In 1963, Rosalyn Coleman Gilchrist, a white Oklahoma housewife, boarded a bus and rode it across the country to march on Washington. It wasn’t her first civil rights protest. On the bus she agreed to sell her home — in her all-white suburb — to a black doctor. Before the sale went through, the city fathers had her arrested and confined in the state mental hospital. She lost her home, her children, and her freedom. Five years later her youngest son — now facing prison for his own resistance to the draft and the Vietnam War — obtained his mother’s freedom. SPOKE takes readers from the lunch-counter sit-ins of the early 1960s to the draft-board raids later that same decade; from Martin Luther King’s 1963 March on Washington to the 1968 DC Mobilization Against the War; from the nightmarish conditions of mid-century state mental institutions to the soul-less sterility of the federal prison system; from the advent of women’s lib to the dawn of the sexual revolution. A big-hearted, beautifully detailed story, chronicling how one mother and son grew closer amid unspeakable tragedy and the upheaval of a nation. Coleman's story is an important footnote to American history, one that highlights how the pursuit of justice--even amid tragedy and in the face of evil--can transform lives in profound and powerful ways. --Dean Bakopoulos, author of My American Unhappiness A mother and son endure tragedy, adversity and injustice, and draw on deep personal strength, in this weighty, evocative memoir. Joe Gilchrist is 10 years old when his mother, Rosie, is burned in a kitchen blaze in their suburban Oklahoma home. Whether it was an accident or an attempted suicide is never spoken aloud. Horribly disfigured and societally shunned, Rosie is befriended by African-American civil rights activists and sees Martin Luther King, Jr. speak in Washington, D.C.. Joe's abusive father has her committed to a mental institution, basing his claim of instability in part on her association with black people. Later, inspired by her fortitude, Joe conscientiously refuses induction into the Vietnam War, earning him an indictment and jail. In and out of prison during the war, Joe becomes an outspoken national advocate of draft resistance. Meanwhile, he remains close to his mother and mixes with a broad, memorable cast of family, friends, inmates, resisters and acquaintances. Some support his anti-war efforts, others distance themselves in response to it. The story, which is a true one, delves deeply into the nature of relationships and into formidable questions such as the culpabilty of those who see wrongs and do nothing to right them. It also draws a line between those who spoke out against the Vietnam War and took non-violent action such as destroying draftee files, and those who espoused violence; the author condemns the latter. Ultimately, Joe and Rosie criss-cross the country, from Oklahoma to Cornell University in upstate New York to New York City. Reflecting four decades after his mother's 1971 death, Joe, whose name is now Coleman, clearly sees his life choices, including accepting that he is gay, as rooted in Rosie's remarkable example. The book's trajectory, which shifts back and forth between significant periods in Joe's life, is skillfully plotted with a course that is not always chronological but is always logical. Throughout, Joe and Rosie remain solidly at the book's center. Skillfully penned to be of equal interest to those who lived though and who were born after Vietnam. And a compelling witness to a definitive era, richly compounded in complexity by true-life family sorrow and triumph. --Karyn L. Saemann, Inkspots, Inc. SPOKE takes readers from the lunch-counter sit-ins of the early 1960s to the draft board and FBI office raids later that same decade; from Martin Luther King's 1963 March on Washington to the 1968 DC Mobilization Against the War; from the nightmarish conditions of mid-century state mental institutions to the soul-less sterility of the federal prison system; from the advent of women's lib to the dawn of the sexual revolution. He challenged Richard Nixon, Henry Kissinger and J. Edgar Hoover in the 1960s. He managed Chicago's premiere music venue (Park West) in the 1970s. He headed Chicago's gay men's health clinic (Howard Brown) in the height of the 1980s AIDS epidemic. He owned a successful software company (The Conference Works) in the 90s. In the early 21st century he built his own outdoor black-box theatre (Alley Stage), where, over five years, he premiered 30 new plays by American playwrights. Coleman is the author of an award-winning memoir (SPOKE) and more than two dozen plays, including A CONTEST OF WILLS, INFAMOUS MOTHERS, SIN EATER and FAUX POE. He received a Literary Artist Fellowship from the Wisconsin Arts Council and is a three-time recipient of an artist-community collaboration grant from the Wisconsin Arts Council. He teaches writing workshops for the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He is a two-