Latest Project: Two Scoops of Hooah / Love My Rifle More Than You - Now Querying . . .

When Briana Stepanek joined the Indiana National Guard in 2005, she gave the US Army a blank check for any value up to and including her life. She just didn’t think they’d try to cash it in so soon—I mean seriously, she was just trying to pay for college.

As a proud member of the nerd herd, Briana was always going to find Basic Combat Training difficult, but the manipulative drill sergeants breaching the army’s fraternization policy add a whole new twist. She unites her barracks buddies to bring down the men who exercise absolute power over them, but her reward is being sent to Afghanistan.

Briana struggles to accept her identity as a soldier, but her confidence grows with each new challenge. When she is drawn into a mission to gather intel from Afghani women, her team is ambushed and cut off. Briana’s comrades look to her to lead them to safety.

This project is an 80,000-word young adult contemporary fiction novel. It is a coming-of-age story set against the backdrop of the war in Afghanistan. Serious themes are advanced under the covering fire of humor and friendship to suit a YA audience. Further Tours of Duty could lead to this novel being part of a series. It would sit alongside Sunrise over Fallujah by Walter Dean Myers, Front Lines by Michael Grant, and Something Like Normal by Trish Doller.