The latter half of 2026 has been a busy one for me! I finally followed through with a thought and vision to take my previous work, Preparing to Prepare, and drill down into specific topics noted therein. I’ve truly wanted to expand some of the larger concepts like: orchards, water harvesting, energy, bartering, bug-in/bug-out, long term food, family emergency planning, communication, home/property hardening and purchasing, and biblical topics like diet and exercise. Some of these have already been published but I’ll get to those in a minute.
For those not in the know, Preparing to Prepare takes a duration-based approach to the potential disruptions or calamities that might befall an individual, family, community, or region. These disruptions to daily life could be weather-related, societal, or originate from unexpected places like health problems and loss of employment. Preparing to Prepare walks the reader through personal assessments by asking the reader to answer very specific thought-provoking questions geared toward helping them understand their environment and the potential pitfalls that life may throw at them. Readers aren't left hanging though as I provide clarity and proposed solutions, concepts, suggestions, lists, and points to make note of in order to handle minor (1-week max), moderate (1-3 weeks max), and major (4-weeks +) disruptions to everyday life.
If I’m being honest, my biggest obstacle was time. Time to write, time to research, time to storyboard… time for any of it, but the passion for the subject matter was there all along. I just needed to figure out a way to get the topics identified and out into the world. Because, to me, an integral part of preparedness planning is the sharing of knowledge and information. In the end, that’s all my writing really is. It’s me sharing as much of my knowledge, information, and passions as far and as wide as I possibly can.
Now that you’ve got a primer, I would say that given the emphasis on AI by my employer, and the advancements made in technology as of late, have pushed me over the edge to pull the trigger. As of this writing, I’ve broken out seven stand-alone topical books with the aid of AI. To start, I fed the tool (ChatGPT on the Pro setting) my Preparing to Prepare manuscript as published and gave it a simple prompt: Review the attached file and determine what, if any, topics can be broken out as stand-alone topics of at least 150 pages. After chewing on it for about 15 minutes or so, it finally gave me the results. Of the dozen or so topics it identified, I have generated, reviewed, edited, and published seven of the topics as stand-alone pieces of non-fiction to complement my previous works in Home Remedies, Poultice, Salves, & Tinctures and the oft mentioned Preparing to Prepare. These seven titles are as follows (based on date of publication):
The Home-Scale Orchard: A Practical Research-Based Field Guide
This guide was developed as a practical planning reference for hobby growers, homesteaders, small family farms, and anyone wishing to establish an orchard on modest acreage. It emphasizes thoughtful planning before planting, selecting plants that fit both the climate and the available space, and understanding that long-term success comes from choosing the right varieties—not simply the most popular ones. Throughout these pages you will find guidance for every USDA Cold Hardiness Zone from 1 through 11, while recognizing that cold hardiness is only one part of the equation. Summer heat, winter chill accumulation, rainfall, humidity, soil chemistry, elevation, prevailing winds, disease pressure, and local microclimates all influence whether a particular crop will truly succeed. Consequently, this guide should be viewed as a planning companion rather than an absolute planting prescription.
The Practical Water Harvesting Guide
This guide was developed as a practical planning companion for homeowners, homesteaders, small farms, schools, community gardens, remote cabins, and preparedness-minded households and is based in no small part on excerpts from my original book, Preparing to Prepare: A General Guide to Self-Sufficiency and Preparedness. The Practical Water Harvesting Guide begins with determining intended uses, estimate demand, calculate yield, size storage, select treatment, plan pumps and controls, install safely, and maintain the system. It then expands that framework into greywater, modular barrel arrays, above- and belowground cisterns, off-grid pumping, treatment by contaminant class, passive earthworks, wells and open sources, emergency operations, and phased implementation.
This guide has been written and designed as a planning companion rather than an absolute prescription. Climate, season, population density, disability, local production, household composition, law, transport, security, social trust, and the duration of disruption all change what is useful. While all the above remain and hold true, the one overriding factor that cannot be ignored in a post-SHTF world is the reason the SHTF in the first place. This event will determine how quickly fiat currency becomes obsolete and how quickly the exchange of services, PMs, and other forms of currency move up the list of acceptable forms of payment.
This guide was not written or meant to recreate deprivation or to treat antiquity as nutritionally perfect because we know it wasn't. Rather, the Guide uses historical inquiry as a practical filter: choose recognizable foods, cook more often, appreciate seasonality, move the body regularly, and remain honest about the distance between an ancient household and a modern kitchen. We know from Scripture and archeological evidence that the diet of the time was heavy on grains, fresh dairy, fruits and vegetables, along with fish, lamb, beef, and chicken. Therefore, Part I begins with the evidence behind food in Roman-period Judaea and Galilee. It explains which foods were staples, which were seasonal or costly, and which modern ingredients do not belong in a first-century reconstruction. The recipe library then turns period-plausible ingredients into forty-six modern household recipes. Every recipe is displayed as an algorithmic flow diagram modeled on the same logic: prepare, combine, cook, finish, and serve.
Part II distinguishes ancient daily movement from modern exercise science because, let's face it... everyday life was the Apostles gym. This is why the second part of the book deals exclusively with movement and body-weight only exercises. It also provides a form library with original illustrations, a progressive ninety-day plan, short session cards, and recovery tools. The plan starts with modest doses because consistency, balance, and joint comfort matter more than exhaustion.
Food After the Fall: Stockpiling, Gathering, and Preserving Food Before, During, and After TEOTWAWKI
This guide began as an expansion of the food-related material contained within Preparing to Prepare. That earlier work introduced bulk storage, gardening, orchards, root cellars, foraging, woodlots, charcoal, smokehouses, and the idea that a serious preparedness plan needs a backup to its backup. Food After the Fall pulls those food threads into a single, stand-alone system. The goal is not merely to own more cans. It is to create a food supply that can survive a power outage, a lost income, a failed harvest, a regional disaster, or a long emergency. Food security is not one object. It is a chain. Stored calories buy time. Gardens, orchards, livestock, wild foods, and community trade replace what is consumed. Preservation moves a harvest forward into the next season. Fuel, water, tools, sanitation, knowledge, and labor keep the chain from breaking. Start small. Practice now, while mistakes are inexpensive. Rotate what you store. Eat what you plan to rely upon. Learn at least two ways to perform every critical task. Then teach someone else.
Power After the Grid: Generators, Solar, Batteries, and Fuel for Household Resilience
Power outages are common enough to be familiar and uncommon enough to catch people unprepared. A thunderstorm takes down a feeder line. Ice loads a tree until it falls across a road and the wires beside it. A hurricane or wildfire forces a utility to shut down sections of its system. A vehicle strikes a pole. Equipment fails. A construction crew cuts the wrong line. In most cases the lights return after a few hours. Sometimes they don't. Power After the Grid is designed to help a household build a practical, layered power plan. The central idea is simple: resilience is not the same thing as owning a generator, a stack of solar panels, or a large battery. Resilience is the ability to keep the right functions operating for the required length of time, under the conditions that actually exist, without creating a new hazard. Equipment matters, but the plan that connects the equipment to the household matters more.
Get Home, Get Out, Stay Mobile: Vehicle Readiness, Evacuation Routes, Bags, and Crisis Mobility
A power failure can be endured without leaving home. A house fire, wildfire, chemical release, flood, storm surge, structural failure, or evacuation order may remove that option in minutes. At the opposite extreme, a household can create needless danger by leaving a sound home for congested roads, uncertain shelter, and a destination that has not been confirmed. Crisis mobility is therefore not simply the ability to drive away. It is the ability to decide whether movement is safer than remaining in place, prepare the people and equipment required for either choice, and change plans when conditions no longer match the assumptions on which the original decision was based. This guide was born from the evacuation-route, vehicle-planning, shelter, location, and portability discussions in Preparing to Prepare. The earlier work introduced the need to understand building exits, local and regional routes, vehicle emergency equipment, get-home supplies, destination climate, map use, pre-positioned resources, and the weight of anything that may eventually have to be carried. Those subjects are expanded upon to create complete household mobility system.
—————
So there you have it, folks. That’s the most recent seven non-fiction books by me. There are others waiting in the wings though. The tentative titles for the next six planned manuscripts are:
The Family Emergency Plan: A Practical Workbook for Home, School, Work, and Evacuation
The Prepared Home: Home Hardening, Shelter-in-Place, and Utility Continuity
The Prepared Property: Selecting and Developing a Resilient Homestead or Retreat
52 Skills Before You Need them: A Year of Practical Preparedness
Communications When Networks Fails
Preparedness Without Acreage: An Apartment, Condo, Rental, and HOA Guide
I have a few others up my sleeve but I don’t want to give it all away…