In the literary tradition of The Things They Carried and All Quiet on the Western Front—a devastating portrait of a young man learning to disappear.

Calvin Webb stands at windows. In small-town Kansas during the Dust Bowl, watching is safer than participating. Observation is easier than action. When a boy falls from a roof and Calvin freezes instead of running for help, he learns what paralysis costs.

The U.S. Navy promises to fix what's broken. Boot camp will teach him to act without thinking. To move without hesitating. To become useful instead of frozen. And it works. Eight weeks of breaking down and rebuilding transforms the boy who watched into a sailor who obeys.

But on the USS Arizona in Pearl Harbor, Calvin discovers the truth: the Navy didn't fix his paralysis. It erased him entirely. He follows orders. He works his shifts in the engine room. He writes empty letters home. He becomes exactly what they wanted—efficient, obedient, and nothing at all.

December 7, 1941 begins like any other day. Calvin is halfway to the engine room when he hears the wrong sound. This is the moment he's been practicing for his entire life. The moment when counting stops and action begins. The moment that will decide if sailors are better than the boys they used to be.

Before the Water Rose is the first book in The Arizona Series—six standalone novels that each follow a different USS Arizona crew member from birth to the morning of the Pearl Harbor attack. Readers describe it as "devastating," "unforgettable," and "the most honest war novel in decades."

For readers who loved The Things They Carried, All the Light We Cannot See, and Atonement.