told partly in the third person

Deshan has worked in publishing for 20 years, and helped make about 75 books — mainly as a designer (but also as layouts artist, editor or photographer). He founded a magazine and edited it for 5 years; wrote 17 children’s books; and photographed communities recovering from a tsunami and a civil war. These experiences inform his work and have taught him to be self-motivated, adaptable, and mindful. He doesn’t like writing in the third person, but somehow, first person seems even weirder.

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What follows is mainly a writer’s CV, 
but I work with books in a number of ways —

if you’re creating a book and you need someone to write, edit, illustrate, design, or take photographs, please do get in touch —

I may be able to help, or recommend someone who can.
I’m available for commissioned work in 2023,
via deshan10@gmail.com

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SHORT VERSION

Deshan is a writer, book designer, and lapsed photographer.

He wrote Mary Anning’s Grewsome Beasts (Penguin, 2021) — a non-fiction book of history and palaeontology, for kids aged 9-12. He also wrote 17 storybooks for Think Equal’s global SEL curriculum.

His short comic, Metta Helmet, with art by Isuri Dayaratne, appeared in the Eisner and Ignatz Award-winning anthology, Elements: Fire (Beyond Press, 2017). 

In 2022, Deshan illustrated his first book. Written by human rights lawyer Amal de Chickera, Kaputu Kaak is a free, trilingual project about civics and protest, for Sri Lankan kids aged 9-12. Here are the online editions, in English, Sinhala, and Tamil. 

Deshan was a Fulbright Visiting Scholar at Berkeley in 2009 (Photography). 

He’s sometimes online as @deshan10 on Twitter. 

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LONG VERSION
I can’t imagine who might need this, but here it is:

Deshan is a writer, book designer, and lapsed photographer.

He wrote Mary Anning’s Grewsome Beasts (Penguin, 2021) — a non-fiction book of history and palaeontology, for kids aged 9-12. He also wrote 17 storybooks for Think Equal’s global SEL curriculum, which was difficult and life-affirming. Olivia Colman narrates the audiobook for one of them, which Deshan has filed under “Cannot possibly be real”. 

His short comic, Metta Helmet, with art by Isuri Dayaratne, appeared in the Eisner and Ignatz Award-winning anthology, Elements: Fire. Deshan’s other comics have appeared in collections by Image Comics, ShortBox, and Inkbrick. A work-in-progress comic called Podi, was written by Deshan and Navin Ratnayake, with illustrations by Isuri Dayaratne (forthcoming, Oni Press).

This year, Deshan illustrated his first book. Written by human rights lawyer Amal de Chickera, Kaputu Kaak is a free, trilingual project about civics and protest, for Sri Lankan kids aged 9-12. Here are the free, online editions, in English, Sinhala, and Tamil. 

Occasionally Deshan writes things for grown-ups, like (a) Traditional Culture and Aesthetics of Sri Lanka,’ for a forthcoming volume of the Bloomsbury Encyclopaedia of Asian Design, and (b) comics reviews for PanelxPanel, SOLRAD, and Caravan. 

He was a Fulbright Visiting Scholar at Berkeley in 2009 (Photography). He has an peculiar collection of pictures from that project, including astronauts underwater; a gig by The Flaming Lips on an artificial island; the celebration of an Aztec goddess; and a handsome dog on a leather chair, at a bar, who claims to have graduated in 1910.

He’s sometimes online as @deshan10 on Twitter.