Sid Balman Jr. is a Pulitzer-nominated national security correspondent and awarded author who has covered wars in the Persian Gulf, Somalia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Kosovo, and has traveled extensively with two American presidents and four secretaries of state on overseas diplomatic missions. He has received numerous awards for the best-selling novels in his Seventh Flag Trilogy. He is currently a Writer In Residence at Sul Ross State University, as well as a working journalist and magazine contributor. A fourth-generation Texan, Balman lives in Alpine, Texas, and has two children and a dog.