Over the past couple of days, we’ve emailed libraries across the U.S., telling them about Onion Breath and asking them to consider the book for their collections. Libraries are one of the last public institutions specifically dedicated to improving the mental landscape of the nation. They’ve traditionally been great advocates of diversity and tolerance, so we’re approaching them on this basis.

In most libraries, anyone with a valid library card can request additions to the collection. We hope our friends in the humanist and atheist communities will go online or visit their local libraries and ask them to get Onion Breath. As Amanda said, “Whether it helps normalize atheism in broader society will depend on it being carried by libraries and bookstores, and being read by families who do not identify as atheists.” We hope kids with no idea that there are atheists in their communities will open the book in their libraries and run to mommy or daddy asking questions. It all begins with questions.

An early response to the email came from a library administrator in Logan, Iowa. It said:

Hmmm! No God ? No Creator? I Wonder where they got all
their humor and creativity? A Fish I suppose, Wonder who
created the fish? Something to chew on!!!

We emailed back:

Well, we have our own ideas on that, of course. The cool thing is, Onion Breath doesn’t try to slam religion or recruit for atheism. It just mentions that the characters are all atheists. If kids become familiar with the fact that the world they’re living in is filled with diversity, they may grow up more open to different points of view. That’s why we think Onion Breath belongs in your library. Thanks!

We hope even librarians who are not atheists themselves will put Onion Breath on their shelves, in the name of diversity and tolerance. It’s important for kids (even the most conventional kids) to know there are other types of people in the world. Libraries get endowments, grants and government money to buy books like this. If they’re buying titles that support ethnic, lifestyle, or religious minorities, they ought to be buying Onion Breath. But usually it takes someone requesting the book to alert them there’s a community that needs service.

So please ask your library to get Onion Breath! And please let us know how it goes. Thanks!! Dan & Steph.

Last summer, we donated a bunch of copies of Onion Breath to the Michigan Camp Quest. We were told the books would be distributed to at least the younger campers, and read at the campfire. Maybe discussed.

This was what we had in mind for Onion Breath, so we were happy to be able to contribute something.

This fall, we got an email from Amanda Metskas, the Executive Director of Camp Quest. She said she had been given the rest of the copies of Onion Breath that kids hadn’t taken home. “I really like the book,” she told us. “It’s funny, not preachy, and the illustrations are great.” She said she was going to write a review of the book for the Institute for Humanist Studies‘ weekly e-zine, the Humanist Network News, and that it might be mentioned at the upcoming Atheist Alliance International Conference outside Washington, D.C.

Turns out, Amanda gave out copies of Onion Breath to parents whose kids attended the Camp Quest Mini-camp at the Conference. “Everyone was really excited about the book,” she said. “I read it aloud to the kids for story time one evening of our program and the kids were really into it.” Becky Hale from EvolveFISH said her daughter got a copy for attending the mini-camp. This is great!

Amanda’s review is in the October 10th edition of HNN.  (Click here to see it)  She says “whether it helps normalize atheism in broader society will depend on it being carried by libraries and bookstores, and being read by families who do not identify as atheists.” We hope it does — one of our ideas for Onion Breath is that it will be seen in libraries by kids from diverse backgrounds, and not just by atheist kids. Amanda also makes some observations about skepticism. We hope, as she suggests, that the boys’ skeptical reaction to Shmirna’s teaching is one of many jumping-off points for kid-adult conversations.

“I highly recommend this book to parents, regardless of their worldview, who are looking for a fun story to read with their kids,” Amanda concluded. We appreciate the endorsement, and hope the review leads to more people hearing about Onion Breath.

Out for a stroll with my parents and we crossed paths with three young men dressed in white shirts and ties. Nope, it wasn’t the geek squad coming to say hi, but the other guys dressed in white shirts and ties. What I thought was going to be just a “hello, nice night for a walk” kind of encounter turned into yet another Mormon-trying-to-save-the-world episode. The young (really young) ring-leader inquired about my mother’s button on her jacket (a white button with a big “A+” on it). She informed him that it was to represent that she supports a scholarship fund in her hometown.

He just said “Oh,” and then he pointed to his name badge. “We are missionaries.” Dan was quick to respond, “We are Atheists.” The teenaged “Elder” looked shocked. And then looked up to the sky and asked us, “Can I ask what is your purpose?” My mom replied as she pointed to her beautiful grandchildren, “having fun, taking walks on beautiful nights like this and having babies.”

He didn’t seem to hear her. The other two guys were listening and seemed embarrassed. My dad then told them, “you do it your way and we will do it ours.” The elder seemed to accept that, or at least he was prepared to give up trying to save us. But then he asked us if we knew of anyone that might like to hear from them or need their guidance.

We said no. We were being polite. He clearly couldn’t conceive of the idea that his question was like us asking him if he knew of anyone who needed to be deprogrammed. I don’t like to get rude with these people; that doesn’t do our cause any good, but fer crine-out-loud could he take the putty out of his ears?!

Two days passed. We put the incident out of our minds, convinced it was an isolated unpleasant event. Then our neighbors gave us a farewell goodie bag. Nice gesture, right? Well, yes and no. Amongst the goodies was The Book of Mormon. (no, we didn’t live in Utah) These are very nice people, but I have to say giving us that book put a sour taste in my mouth. After we thought they were friends, who could accept us as we are, another last ditch effort to save the world. I thought about giving her a copy of Onion Breath…but then I thought, nah, why waste a book? Because I know where it would end up. Also, there’s no comparison. Onion Breath doesn’t exactly proselytize. She gave us the friggin’ Book of Mormon.

More people need to hear others say they are “Atheist” so it isn’t so surprising.

Good news for Shmirna! Onion Breath is now available on EvolveFISH, the oldest online seller of Darwin, evolve, and other atheist car plaques and emblems. They’ve been in business over 14 years, and reach a huge number of progressive and humanist customers with their wide range of really cool merchandise. We’re happy they invited Onion Breath to be part of their lineup!

FISH is an acronym for Freethinkers in Service to Humanity. NICE!! They have a wide variety of items, so you can get your Rational Responders T-Shirt in the same order as Onion Breath. And they ship anywhere in the world. So join them in supporting secularism, progressive ideals, environmentalism and peace. As they say at EvolveFISH, a chest or bumper is a terrible thing to waste.

Since Onion Breath “went live,” a couple of weeks ago we’ve sent out a bunch of books to reviewers in the atheist community in North America, Australia and England. We just got a couple of very nice emails, informing us of our first review. FreeThoughtGuy wrote a terrific article on Onion Breath that went out in this week’s newsletter of the San Francisco Atheists group. Here it is, for those who haven’t found their way here from there:

Who likes onion breath? Well, no one likes onion breath, but these words take on a sweeter meaning with a new children’s book. Onion Breath tells the fun story of two brothers who are fussy eaters, refusing anything but mac-and-cheese. Mother does not know how to get them to eat new things, but Shmirna, the nanny, does. Shmirna tells the boys that spiders crawl into their open mouths at night, and the only way to stop the spiders is having onion breath by eating something new - onions. The macabre gambit works, and the boys learn the value of trying new things.

The quirky-fun story is told in clever rhyme, and the bright artwork really pops off the pages with its blend of sketches, fabric designs and occasional cut-and-pasted photos. I tuned into my “inner child” while reading the book, and enjoyed the flights of imagination, the humor, and even the scary spiders of Onion Breath.

Page 34 of this book has a matter-of-fact reference to atheism: Now try the side dish and don’t make a face. We’re all atheists, so no need to say grace. The story moves right along, just as life should move right along for all of us.

We’ve all seen ostensibly secular children’s books that slip in overt religious messages. Onion Breath may seem to be the flip side of this, but that comparison is unfair because the book is not pushy, preachy, or apologetic about atheism. It’s just a book about atheists written by atheists with one reference to atheism just to fit a rhyme. No hushed tones, no focal point, no big deal.

Onion Breath authors Steph and Dan Allosso have donated a box of the books to the freethinking summer camp Camp Quest, and the book is available for purchase through the Onion Breath website.

The Allossos have included an epilogue and a paragraph on the back cover that describe the atheism reference. Ideally, this would not be necessary, but then again, this is possibly the first children’s book about an atheist family. Can the era of “Atheist? So what?” be upon us in the future? That’s a pleasant thought, and a trendsetter may very well be Onion Breath.

The review is also on its author’s blog, which is great! We’re going to get more active promoting Onion Breath to the online atheist community. There are a lot of them — just look at the atheist blogroll in the left margin! — and they have a lot of diversity. But many seem like the types who’d get a kick out of Shmirna and her friends.

As FreeThoughtGuy mentioned, it would be nice if the future included a little more of an “of course” reaction to atheism. Onion Breath was our idea of a first step. We have a couple other ideas, if OB does okay. And hopefully other people do too.

“I just got Onion Breath yesterday. Wonderful story! I plan to put it into my library collection and wait for somebody to get heated up about the simple, harmless reference to atheists.” (A.K., IN Librarian)

“We received Onion Breath and we love it! My 8 month old daughter squealed and screamed at the pictures. I liked the story and thought it was fun, and didn’t think it was scary at all.” (L.P., MN)

“These books certainly are pretty… Very nice quality, great printing.” (L.Z., MI)

“I wish you the best success with your new venture! I hope it succeeds not only for you, but for all of us in the secular world!” (A.B., OH)

“Best wishes for a successful book! I wish I read a book like this when I was a lil’ freethinking boy…” (F.T.G., CA)

“We just received our copy of Onion Breath. What a great job! Loved it!” (P.A., CA)

“As a life time atheist who is 80 years old I’d love to buy a copy of your book. What a great idea!! I’m sure there are a lot more atheists in this country than the records say since too many of us won’t admit to it.” (M.W., CT)

Okay, I’m more than a little biased. But this is the prettiest kids’ book I’ve EVER seen!

We went to the the printer today and picked up two boxes of books. We left the rest of the pallet in their air-conditioned, humidity-controlled warehouse. After all, they’re five minutes away and we can get more anytime we run out.

Below is the batch we took directly to the Post Office, to fill the preorders. Oh, and a box that’s going to Camp Quest as our contribution to their camp this summer. And, we’ve given a small pile to Arise Bookstore on 24th and Lyndale, toward their current fundraising campaign. So all you Minneapolitanos out there, get over and buy one from them!

There’s a new FAQ covering questions we’ve had from readers. Click the picture to get there.

The gist of it is that Onion Breath is unique in two ways. First, it “takes back” the word atheism. Second, it is a quirky, slightly macabre story, reminiscent of the old-time fairy-tales. We think this is cool, because we love those old stories. People who prefer Barney and Clifford the Big Red Dog might want to read before they buy, though…

We got the final proof package from our printer this afternoon. There was a setup sheet for the cover, and a mock-up of the entire book, as it will be produced. Cut and stapled, so we could see exactly how it would look in the actual book. And catch any errors.

Of course, there were no errors. These folks are pros, and this isn’t an unusual (or even a particularly big) job for them. They do this all the time. That’s why it’s so easy to work with them — unlike the other guys who pretended they did this all the time, but really had no clue.

The print run will happen sometime in the next few days. In a couple of weeks, the “first printing” of Onion Breath should be completed. It’s amazing, but over the next few days (with a break for the 4th of July), all our books will be printed, cut, bound, boxed and palletized. Then the fun starts.

We have a few advance orders, and a few people lined up to review Onion Breath already. We’re looking for more, of course. We’re going to send out a press release to the general public, probably early next week. In the meantime, we’ve emailed all the U. S. atheist and humanist groups we could find, to give them a heads-up before the rest of the world hears about it.

We expect some negative press, and maybe even some hate-mail, when word gets out. We’ve asked the atheist groups to drop us a line when they see local reports (positive or negative) that we might miss. If we send out the really wide “PR Newswire” type release we’re considering, it goes to over 70,000 journalists. Some of them are sure to be folks who won’t jump onboard and support religious tolerance.

The point of going out to the whole world with this, is we want kids who aren’t atheists to see it too. It would be great if Onion Breath ended up in the hands of a little boy or girl in a library somewhere, who wasn’t even aware that some of her friends aren’t religious. That’s the “Tolerance is Learned” part of the project.

A couple of atheists have questioned us about the content of Onion Breath. They’ve pointed out that as diligent non-believing parents, they’ve gone to great lengths to try to protect their children from irrational beliefs and superstitions. One atheist said “we never lie to our children.”

As parents of 4 kids, aged 4 months to 14 years, we agree. We don’t lie to our kids either. And we don’t want them mistaking superstition and mythology for truth. But we also believe they understand the difference between stories and reality, even at a very young age.

No kid believes that the guy in The Five Chinese Brothers can really swallow the sea. No kid believes that Max really goes on a trip to Where the Wild Things Are. And no kid is going to believe that onions really repel spiders. These are all dramatic elements that take place in a make-believe world. The only difference is, in the make-believe world of Onion Breath, the people happen to be atheists.

Being an atheist doesn’t preclude a person from having an imagination or a sense of humor. Part of our aim writing Onion Breath was to demonstrate this. Steph would never actually tell our kids that spiders were going to get them in their sleep. But Shmirna’s a quirky old lady. In the make-believe world of Onion Breath, it isn’t entirely clear if she’s kidding or not. But not to worry, it’s only make-believe.