Tomorrow is Bookcon at the Main Branch Library Downtown. Click the Bookcon logo to see all the details at the SJCPL official website.

I have one more illustration that I hope to complete before I pack everything up for tomorrow. But as of this moment, I have quite a few things to show in addition to the copies of two of my books.

I’ll be selling my essay collection Operation Iraqi Freedom is My Fault, and I’ll be selling my book of fiction Battle Rattle and Other Stories (that book includes my Kindle Single Best Selling books Waiting for the Enemy and Battle Rattle as well as the novel High Desert Rats). All of the work is related to war and its effects on the families that participate in it. That’s what I spent most of my time writing about before my children were born, and now that I’m starting to get back into writing, it appears I wasn’t finished thinking and writing about that subject.

This is one of my war baby watercolors. Why *War Babies* one might ask. If I knew then I would probably stop making them.

The books will be 10 dollars tomorrow in person. Battle Rattle and Other Stories can be bought on Amazon for $14.99 at any time, but in order to get a copy of Operation Iraqi Freedom is My Fault, which is no longer in print, this will be the your only chance for a while. I have plans to try and get it republished in the future, but until then, these are the last ten copies that I possess. I will take cash, but I won’t have any change. So Venmo, PayPal, and Apple Pay all work for me if you don’t have a ten dollar bill, or a combination of bills that add up to ten dollars.

Watercolors and sketches are for sale as well. I’ll probably have a painting on display behind me from my War Babies series; that will be for sale too, and all oil paintings are 3 dollars per square inch. I’ll have it marked so you won’t need to bring a ruler and a calculator. Any pencil sketch is 60 dollars. Watercolors in 11x17 are $375. 12x18 is $435. One of these days I’ll have prints available, but for the time this is what I have and this is how it goes. I’m happy to discuss commissions too.

There is some stuff in the binders that is violent, so don’t let your young kids flip through there unless you’re okay with them seeing some comic book style violence. None of it is photorealistic or anything, but I don’t want kids to think they’re going to see Peppa Pig or something. This watercolor of the camel wrapped in Razor Wire is an example of the most extreme stuff in there.

Oh, and finally. If you do purchase one of the sketches or watercolors, then I’ll arrange to get it to you sealed and protected. I will not be able to hand it to you immediately tomorrow unless you are willing to risk walking out with it as is. If you buy it, and you choose to take it out of there unprotected, it’s on you. I am not responsible for it getting destroyed once you have paid me and received it. I’m sorry, but these are one of a kind, and that means if you destroy it, then it is gone forever.

I am working on some projects that do not have anything to do with war now, but it’s unlikely that I’ll ever be able to walk away from the subject completely. I would imagine that each generation believes their war is the last one. How could anyone ever be so stupid as to go to war again after X? Well, it has happened again and again, and I can’t recall who it was that Kurt Vonnegut was talking to at that cocktail party about anti-war books, but they were right. Anti-glacier books are the way to go if you want to write books that people can link to actual change.

I’m very grateful to Grace Downey for putting this event on, and I look forward to meeting some other writers in the community as well as talking with anyone who has the time and interest to stop by. I’ll be sketching, selling, signing, talking, and probably snacking at some point. Feel free to come by and flip through the portfolios and ask me questions or just chat about whatever. I’ll be there from 11-3. You don’t have to buy anything to talk to me. I promise.