The Fire in the Flint

This book is not as unkown as the reviews above suggest. The book is on the reading list of some history and American Lit courses at the University of Georgia. I discovered the book in a display on Georgia History at a shopping mall near Atlanta. I was then able to check it out of my local library. I thought the book was excellent. Unfortunately, the Klan was at its peak in 1924, the same year the book was published. Unfortunately Mr. White knew was he was talking about.

The reason I rate "The Fire in the Flint" five stars is because it is one of the many novels (books as a whole) written by very intelligent African American authors, which do not receive their just due by the mainstream press. Those in the know about the type of society we live in realize that certain books, certain films, certain plays which are truly outstanding, get ignored for reasons that are part of an agenda sometimes unnoticed even by those pushing the agenda. Through this novel (NAACP executive secretary Walter White's first, and I think only one), White proved that he knew from where the South's and this nation's racial problem sprang. Had he not chosen a career as a civil rights leader, and instead, become a full-time novelist, this book proves that eventually he could easily have ranked as high in stature as the best serious novelists in the country. But, obviously, he had his own reasons for pursuing the career path that he did. No doubt, some of those reasons had to do with pragmatism. Nevertheless, this is a very impressive first effort, given that it is alleged that White wrote the entire novel only in a matter of weeks while on a vacation.Imagine what he might have written had he taken a year or two, to refine his theme and narrative? And rest assured, there are PLENTY of other African Americans of White's era who, no doubt, had similar creative talent. Let "The Fire in the Flint" be a lesson to all of us, regarding what we truly DO NOT know about plenty of talented, impressive people, primarily forgotten by history, as well as those not even written up in the history books.

Fire in the Flint is a striking novel that is not only valuable as a work of literature, but also as a historical resource about racial oppression in the segregated South. The main character is a black Harvard-educated doctor who returns home shortly after World War I to set up a medical practice in Georgia. I enjoyed the way that the author W. White tells the story through the eyes of this courageous (and naive) character -- he is familiar with the rules of the segregated South, but at the same time his education and status have made him a stranger, outraged and frustrated at the oppression of his people. Overall this novel is tragic but insightful and as a student I found it very instructive. (I could have done without the clunky romantic side plot that fell flat in my opinion.) Still, a great book!