ARPress is honored to announce that the flipbook format of To Be a Rose by E. B. Mason (Anne Bowen) is now available for purchase. The book is also offered in other formats on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and the ARPress website.
There’s something undeniably magical about holding a paperback or hardback book in your hands, the smell of the pages, the feel of the paper, the satisfying thump as you close it at the end of a great story. It’s a sensory experience that e-readers and screens have struggled to replicate.
But here’s the thing: the world of reading is evolving, and it’s not just about going digital or flipping through pixels on a screen. Enter the flipbook, a fresh, interactive way to experience stories that goes beyond the printed page while still capturing the tactile joy we love.
You might remember flipbooks from childhood, those little booklets where flipping the pages quickly created a tiny animation. Today’s flipbooks have massively leveled up. They’re digital, accessible on any device, and combine the charm of flipping pages with multimedia elements like videos, sound, and clickable links. Imagine reading your favorite novel and encountering subtle animations or embedded audio that brings scenes to life.
Pacific Book Review wrote in its review:
“To Be a Rose isn’t an easy book to pin down, which is probably what makes it linger. It’s part war memoir, part near-death account, part dreamlike meditation on survival. Author E. B. Mason writes from the aftermath of something most people don’t come back from, and you can feel that in every line—he’s not trying to craft an inspiring arc or a polished narrative. He’s trying to tell you what it was like.”
This literary masterpiece was featured in the February 2025 issue of The New York Times Book Review (NYTBR) magazine. It was also showcased at the London Book Fair (LBF) at Olympia London from March 11–13, 2025. Later that same month, it appeared at the 62nd edition of the Bologna Children’s Book Fair (BCBF) in Bologna, Italy, from March 31 to April 3, 2025.
To Be a Rose is a deeply moving memoir that recounts the author’s journey through adversity, survival, and the power of resilience. The book details Mason’s experience traveling to Afghanistan as an advisor, his unexpected battle with a life-threatening illness, and his arduous recovery upon returning home. Through this powerful narrative, readers gain an intimate look at the struggles he faced, the strength he summoned to fight for his life, and the profound ways in which the experience transformed him.
The first part of the book plants you in Kabul, and not the version we see in headlines. It’s loud, layered, choking. Mason’s descriptions are heavy with sensory detail: the “acrid smoke from the grills,” the grime in the air, the heat that clings. But it’s the offhanded brutality of his observations that stop you short. He mentions, almost clinically, that a percentage of what’s floating in the air is “the dust from dried fecal matter or the remains of dead animals or people.” That kind of line doesn’t just land, it haunts.
And then, his body fails him. One moment, he’s pushing through the day. The next, he’s fighting for breath: “I can’t breathe. I can’t complete a sentence…without taking a breath.” The urgency in those moments is real and raw.
From there, the book dissolves into something harder to describe. Mason spends eight weeks in a coma, and what we get are fragments, flashes. German nurses repeating “Nicht schlafen.” (Don’t sleep.) A city of roses. A sentence that lands like a riddle or a revelation: “You have been weighed in the balance, and you are welcome.” Some of these coma sequences feel like metaphors; others feel like memory folding in on itself. They’re not tidy, and they’re not always clear. But in a strange way, that works. This part of the book isn’t about clarity, it’s about proximity to the edge of something unknowable.
The US Review of Books (USRB) recommends To Be a Rose by E. B. Mason (Anne Bowen). Here’s an excerpt from their review:
“Set in 2005, Mason’s raw, heartfelt, and honest memoir recounts his brush with death, leading to weeks spent in a coma, and the lessons he learned during his travel to the afterlife and back. Poignant, thoughtful, and at times irreverently hilarious, this is an incredible story of one man’s journey from the brink of death back to life. Mason masterfully blends memories, philosophical musings, and visions to create a dreamlike memoir, where it can be difficult at times to parse out fact from fiction. Some aspects of his story are not for the faint of heart, as it includes talk of rape and the casualties of war. However, although tackling heavy issues and deep philosophical questions, the author also sprinkles his work with humor and apropos remarks such as, ‘History doesn’t repeat itself, but it does rhyme.’ With a sharp yet compassionate voice, Mason delivers a tale that deftly challenges and inspires.”
If you love books, don’t worry, paperbacks and hardbacks aren’t going anywhere. They still hold a special place on our shelves and in our hearts. But flipbooks open doors to new possibilities that blend tradition with innovation.
Whether you’re a lifelong reader curious about new formats or a creator eager to explore interactive storytelling, flipbooks invite you to go beyond the printed page and rediscover the joy of stories in a whole new way.
To Be a Rose by E. B. Mason (Anne Bowen) is now available for purchase via the ARPress Bookstore.