Still Standing

Still Standing Watch is a deeply human literary novel about PTSD, family fracture, and the difficult work of repair.

Marcus Cole is a veteran who returned home with a war still active inside his body. To the outside world, he is disciplined, functional, and controlled. Inside his home, that control becomes a perimeter. His wife, Donna, learns to listen before she speaks. His daughter, Maya, learns to read the stairs in her socks. His sons learn that ordinary sounds can change the weather of a room.

When Marcus reaches the edge of losing everything, he begins the painful process of naming what has been happening inside him and inside the house. But treatment does not erase the damage. It only begins the work of accountability.

This novel is not about a miraculous recovery. It is about survival after silence, fatherhood after fracture, and the fragile line between being wounded and becoming harmful.

A powerful read for veterans, families, mental health professionals, and anyone who has loved someone carrying pain they could not explain.