So, Preview This Fucking Book I'm Writing...

I mean, it’s gonna be read and reread by you anyway.

As I’ve talked about before, I’m writing a book based on The Marine. Actually, not based on The Marine the person, but on his tattoos.

The Marine is a walking tattoo. Ass cheeks and everything. All but his face and his junk. Beautiful work, the man is a goddam work of art, right? So I asked him, “Marine, what do your tattoos mean?” after seeing “Only God Can Judge Me” across his chest.

I wondered if he was like me, if there was some deal he had rigged up with Pete, because The Marine has done some questionable things, that might make Pete start keeping a fucking journal like the sonofabitch has been keeping on me since 1997. And, yes, he has some sort of religious situation that is still in utero, he hasn’t quite arrived where I am, but he’s young. Eventually, he will try to buy his way in from Purgatory, much as I’ve hoarded tickets to do so myself.

I just don’t think he knows that yet. Give him time, though. We all meet our God at one time or another. I have done so twice. Once the night my daughter came back after she was buried, and I nearly took my life. Once, a day after I was assaulted and was suffering what we now know is CPTSD, and I was afraid to move, breathe, eat, talk, live, exist in anything outside of my 5’2 space. Both times, I know legitimately, I sat down and had a conversation with God, and he carried me through both times I was at the door of Death, knocking and yelling, and demanding I be let in.

God doesn’t just let anyone stroll on through. You gotta have a ticket, sir, and you’ll stand politely in line to get it punched. Bitch.

After talking with The Marine, I developed an idea. What if I had a mercenary friend (I know, I know, I’m just writing about him), one who was telling me the stories behind the tattoos? How they came to be, and what he inked them for. The places he was when he got them, and why he had them memorialized on his skin.

So, Drawn to Neutralize was born in my head. And I’ve been working on it, here and there, not enough, but you know I had that thing with The Marine, and you’re not supposed to fall in love with your character, and I had to work that out. But I’m back to it now. I wasn’t going to do a chapter by chapter release, but I think I’ll do a handful at a time, over on Amazon and Audible. Yea, so I can fucking read you to sleep, and you’re welcome.

So, let me just drum up your little excited hearts.

I’m starting it in Somalia, as we all know that’s familiar Marine engagement for me. The Marine sees some shit that just fucks him up, and starts by telling me the story of watching the atrocities of this local clan through the scope of his rifle. Being unable to help, ordered not to do anything, until he just cannot do so anymore.

He does something. Saves someone who, later in the story, becomes a big voice in a movement we all know and understand now, but was in its infancy then. She becomes a part of his skin at that time. And we follow him all the way through his encounters (and Marine engagements across the world, which is why the historical accuracy is taking me 63 years to get right), and end up in a cave in Afghanistan.

He’s drawing on the walls, and his captors are cluelessly trying to decipher what it is that he’s writing between his name and DoDID. Certainly, he’ll never tell his stories, Uncle Sam has trained him far too well. Then someone realizes it’s a piece of his tattoo they’d seen, and believe it’s the way to unravel him.

So that’s the premise. I’m fairly certain it’s pretty fucking good, and I’m not just saying that because I’m writing it. I’m saying that because my people who have read even the first chapter are excited for it, and I’m excited to tell it. I should have chapters 1-5 edited and in ebook format somewhere in the 90 to 120 day frame. I look forward to all of you reading it and giving me your feedback.

By feedback, of course, I mean singing it’s praises, and buying copies for your friends and loved ones. Anything else, I’ll consider absolute betrayal and it will be met with a hailstorm of fucks, much like any other traitorous activity.

I’ll post the 1st chapter here, as it falls under my copyright. I hope you all love it as much as I already do.