One Cutter Left!
over 2 years ago
– Sun, Aug 22, 2021 at 03:58:18 PM
Hi, everyone!
Some good news: after a lot of writing, rewriting, and research (not in that order), I've finally finished the story of Adak. This one was fortuitous timing, as the cutter's decommissioning was announced while I was working on it. It's sad to see a ship with such history leave the service, but - even though it only changes a few lines - it helps me tell a more complete story. Since I want this book to always feel fresh, even a decade from now, in a way, that helps. In case you missed it, I used some of the artwork from the book to try and raise support for a petition to bring her back home. Unfortunately, like with so many of our historic cutters, I don't think this effort succeeded.
She was harder to write about than I expected. Not only is she the most recent cutter in the book (and the one that people still serving will feel most connected to), she was the cutter that became on-scene commander on 9/11, as the towers came down at Ground Zero. As someone who joined the service right after 9/11, this one hit home. But of course, that's also the point. In order to recapture how that moment felt, I watched hours of television footage, listened to accounts of people fleeing Manhattan, read interviews of people who responded, and generally immersed myself in that day 20 years ago. It felt like the only way to truly pay homage, but I think it was the right decision.
One Cutter Left!
I only have one cutter left, and that's Blackhaw, a 180-foot buoy tender that served in Vietnam. Blackhaw presents a challenge because I have very little info on her: mostly generalities, which make it hard to tell a coherent story. I've been reading through her logs, but even though it notes plenty of instances of rockets being shot past her, it doesn't give me a lot of context. Thankfully, a new book I bought on the Coast Guard in Vietnam just showed up, and it has a pretty sizeable section on Blackhaw, so that should help me fill in some of the gaps.
Once her story is done, I get to do my favorite part: drawing the art! It's where I get to have the most fun. Once I have a complete draft, I then send it off to the Coast Guard Historians, who will do a review to make sure we see eye to eye about the historical accuracy of the book.
We're near the end. As always, thank you for your continued support after all this time. I'm very happy with how everything's turning out, and I think you're going to love the finished book.
-Brian
13 of 15!
about 3 years ago
– Wed, Mar 03, 2021 at 04:31:10 PM
Good evening everyone!
I wanted to share some long-awaited good news about the book. The below graphic shows which cutters' stories I've completed. After finishing up the story of Eagle late last night, I'm now up to 13 of the planned 15 cutters.
So what happens next?
Right now, I'm working to write the stories of the three remaining cutters. After that, I get to do my favorite part: making the artwork. This part generally goes pretty quickly and I've already done a large chunk of it. It's also where I get to have the most fun. Once I've laid out the text and images in the book, I have to send it off to big Coast Guard for a review. I can't give a good estimate of how long that will take, but it's a step I can't skip. After that, I start moving with printing and shipping. And then you get your books.
Thank you as always for your patience. I know it's irritating to wait so long for a book. But I only get one shot to do this, and I've done everything I can to make sure that this is the best book of best cutters I can possibly write.
-Brian
Interview with Task and Purpose!
almost 4 years ago
– Tue, May 26, 2020 at 07:15:15 AM
This post is for backers only. Please visit Kickstarter.com and log in to read.
A quarantine is great for writing...
about 4 years ago
– Fri, Mar 27, 2020 at 12:49:44 PM
Hope everyone is staying safe during this pandemic. While this is definitely a trying time, I'm taking advantage of social distancing and everything being shut down to work on Best Cutters.
Looking back, I definitely wish I'd set up this book a little differently. If I'd known how much research it would take and how many great stories I would find, I wouldn't have done fifteen ships - I would have stuck to maybe five or six. The stories of Northland, Bear, Harriet Lane, Hudson, Campbell, and Pickering would have been earth-shattering enough. But I just couldn't settle. There's too many great stories.
Just as an FYI: even if I do finish while this pandemic is still going on, I won't be shipping books if I think packing and mailing something is also going to bring you a virus. I'm also going to have to think long and hard about where to have it printed (probably not in China at this point - for a variety of reasons), which may result in some changes to the final product.
Take care of yourselves!
-Brian
Check out my article in Proceedings!
over 4 years ago
– Tue, Dec 03, 2019 at 07:09:53 PM
If you're interested in why I decided to write a book capturing a lot of obscure incidents from Coast Guard history, then the article I wrote for USNI is where to look. We need our history so we can explain who we are, what we do, and why we exist. It builds and ethos and a sense of purpose. It's a combination of rescuer and warfighter, but it's easy to neglect too much of one for the other.
https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2019/december/reclaim-coast-guards-military-roots
-Brian
