Blood and Sand: A Corpsmans ledger of war (The Ledger of Survival Book 1)

Blood and Dust: A Corpsman’s Ledger of War is a work of adult literary war fiction set during the Afghanistan conflict between 2011 and 2013, told through the eyes of a Navy Hospital Corpsman embedded with Marine infantry on remote combat outposts and foot patrols. Written as a series of interconnected narratives, the book traces the gradual transformation of service from arrival to aftermath, documenting how violence, repetition, and responsibility accumulate rather than resolve.

The story begins on combat outposts far from rear areas, where training gives way to reality almost immediately. Early patrols, first casualties, and limited resources establish a world where preparation does not guarantee control and help is never close. As the deployment settles into routine, danger becomes normalized without becoming safe, and the corpsman’s role evolves from nervous responder to relied-upon constant, quietly watched by the Marines he is tasked with keeping alive.

Interwoven throughout are moments of dark humor, exhaustion, and absurdity—burn pits, bad coffee, improvised fixes, and fleeting glimpses of FOB life that offer contrast but no escape. As time passes, violence returns heavier, shaped by familiarity and cumulative loss. Casualties gain names and histories, medical interventions are haunted by memory, and the limits of medicine become impossible to ignore. Skill, speed, and effort are sometimes not enough, and the environment itself—terrain, heat, and distance—acts as an unyielding adversary.

The final sections move beyond Afghanistan to the quiet persistence of war after redeployment. Reintegration, disrupted sleep, fractured relationships, and the loss of comrades after the uniform comes off—particularly through suicide—are examined with the same restraint as the battlefield chapters. The book closes without resolution or catharsis, reinforcing that this is not a story of healing or redemption, but a record of what is carried home.

Written as fiction but grounded in lived experience, Blood and Dust avoids heroics and spectacle in favor of honesty and memory. It is intended for adult readers and contains themes of combat violence, trauma, sexual assault, PTSD, and suicide. This is not a war story about winning or losing. It is about standing where the corpsman stands when the shooting stops—and what follows long after the dust settles.