For the physical illustrated edition of Waiting for the Enemy that I’m working on right now, I’ve decided to include a few stories that were not in it in the past that were published long ago. This illustration is for “Brown Eyed Babe which was in Berkeley Fiction Review issue number 30.

The story is a kind of fairy tale, or as close to one as I’ve ever written, but it really does seem to have predicted the way my life was going to go. Or maybe it was just subconsciously guiding me where I needed to be? I don’t know.

Regardless, it’ll be in there as a little preface to the rest of the stories that are much more grounded in reality. I’ll add “Spectres”, and I think also “Deflated.” This way it’ll be the book I wanted it to be in the first place and it’ll give folks who have a copy of the old book an excuse to get this one too.