Showing posts with label Writing to be Read. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Writing to be Read. Show all posts

Wednesday, July 23, 2025

Undawnted Interviews Chris Barili, Day Three of the WordCrafter Shadow Blade Book Blog Tour




Interview with Author Chris Barili
 

What makes this book (Shadow Blade) a story that impelled you to write it?

I developed Shadow Blade based on an exercise in a class on researching for fiction during my MFA studies at Western State Colorado University. The professor gave us an in-class assignment to take a word commonly used in our chosen genre and do ten minutes of research on it. I chose “Assassin,” and the history of that word was so interesting that when I left class that day, I knew I would be writing it as a possible thesis. It has everything a fantasy story needs. There’s adventure, romance, deception, heroics, and of course, at the center of it all, magic.

The original “assassins” were a small sect of muslim fundamentalists controlling portions of northern Persia during the crusades. They were said to have been addicted to hashish, which their leader used to make them invulnerable, and to keep them absolutely loyal. My immediate thought was, “what if they (the Denari Lai) weren’t addicted to a drug, but to magic? What if that power came from their god, Nishi,but was doled out by their leader, the Chargh Lai, and used to not only make them successful, but to spy on them, control them, and ultimately, if they disobeyed too much, to end them? The very next question that came to me was, “What if one such assassin is sent to kill a princess, but falls in love with her and has to battle with his faith to determine his future?

So you have this dynamic where magic is like a drug that is used to control Denari Lai, and suddenly one of those assassins finds something so powerful that it threatens his devotion to his God. What’s stronger for him, the love of his God, or his love for the princess. 
 

Which, if any, of the characters do you identify with the most?

That’s a tough one. I think I’d have to say perhaps Captain Marwan Bauti—the man vowed to protect Princess Makari. He knows something is wrong, that Ashai is a threat, but no one will listen to him.
 

What is it about the magic genre that attracts you to write it?

The fantasy genre has always attracted me for a couple of reasons. First, it tends to draw a pretty straight line between good and evil, which I think we’ve lost the ability to do in our world today. And secondly, just about anything is possible in the fantasy genre, meaning all kinds of exciting things can happen.


Is Book 2 of the series on the way? How many books of the series do
you plan on publishing?


Shadow Blade is currently plotted out to be a trilogy. I am about halfway done the rough draft of book two (untitled), but I am working on the next Hell’s Marshal book at this time, so it’ll be a bit before book two is out.
 

What themes resonate with this story, yourself, and your readers?


If I start sounding off what themes are in this story, it’s likely to act as a spoiler for how it ends. So on this one, I’ll plead the Fifth.
 

Chris "Stealth" Barili
Website: Authorchrisbarili.ink
Buy Shadow Blade here:
https://books2read.com/Shadow-Blade

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Support Great Artists 

Read Shadow Blade by Chris Barili: 

books2read.com/ShadowBladeDenariLai

 
 Buy your copy today! 
 

 

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About the Book

Ashai Larish is an assassin from the brutal Denari Lai order. Religious zealots, Denari Lai are kept loyal through an addiction to the same magic that makes them unstoppable. They have become the primary weapon for the nation of Nishi'iti, and in a hundred years, they have never failed.

Until now. Ashai must kill Pushtani King Abadas Damar and his daughter/heir, Makari. He infiltrates the king's inner circle, putting him in the perfect place to strike, with only Captain Bauti of the Royal Guard at all suspicious of Ashai's intent.

Except Ashai has fallen for Makari and cannot complete the hit. When a second Denari Lai kills the King, Ashai finds himself fighting for Makari's life instead of taking it. To make matters worse, the order cuts him off from his magic, leaving him weakened and in withdrawal. Meanwhile, far north in the Pushtani mines that border Nishi'iti, a slave named Pachat learns that his love, a hand slave to Makari, died at the hands of a Denari Lai assassin. His grief ignites a slave rebellion, and Pachat becomes the unwilling leader of the revolt. Urged on by Nishi'iti guerrillas, the rebellion sweeps across the borderlands, threatening to erupt into all-out war. Yet all Pachat wants is to avenge his beloved's death by killing the assassin, so he walks away from the rebellion to seek when it needs him most.

As Pachat makes off for the capital of Dar Tallus, Ashai is forced to rely on that city's organized crime gang to hide from the second assassin, and from Bauti's guards. Despite his best efforts to hide it, Makari discovers Ashai's true identity, and suddenly, he finds himself without her love, without his faith, and without the Denari Lai. At rock bottom, he doubts he can do anything but cause more damage.

Can Ashai kill the second assassin and win back Makari's love? Will Pachat gain the revenge he so lustily seeks?

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*Give Away*

If you follow the tour and leave a comment at each stop to let us know you were there or share your thoughts about the book, you can win a free copy of Shadow Blade. We’re giving away three digital copies of the book, and one lucky winner will receive a print copy of the book signed by author Chris Barili. Each stop you comment on earns you an entry into the random drawing, and the winners will be announced on Writing to be Read in the “WordCrafter News” post on July 27.

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Tour Schedule

Monday, July 21: Writing to be Read- Book Trailer
Tuesday, July 22: Robbie's Inspiration - Guest post
Wednesday July 23: Undawnted - Interview with Chris Barili
Thursday, July 24: Roberta Writes - Reading Excerpt from Baiting the Hook, narrated by Jeff Bowles
Friday, July 25: Writing to be Read - Live appearance by Chris Barili

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Feed the Artist Inside

Need more Asian-inspired artistry? Enjoy dramatic readings and music: 
 


 



Monday, April 28, 2025

Undawnted's Ages Instrumental Album Available on YouTube

My new album, Ages, was inspired by the poems that were published and I wrote for the Poetry Treasures 5: Small Pleasures anthology. 

Ages is an instrumental medley. Each song has its own presence, style, and grace. Listen to these singles while studying or working to help you tune out distractions and focus on what is important.

Or, listen to relax and unwind from the day. 

Ages Album Playlist (YouTube)

For information about my original music, visit the Music tab and Ages album page.

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DL Mullan has been a musical wonder and performer for decades.

A teacher noticed her abilities on her dynamic, and technically perfect, first use of the violin at age ten during class. She was rushed into Competitive Orchestra the next school year. 
 
After switching schools, her junior high music teacher discerned her aptitude in class. As Ms. Mullan played the violin and the school only offered band and choir, she believed her musical calling would go unanswered. Fortunately, the band instructor loved the idea of having a string instrumentalist. DL Mullan was the first violinist invited into the group and seated in the flute section. She spent two years in band, which she became a magnet for other string-playing students, as well as succeeding to second chair. 

Her Arts Magnet high school was a different matter. A violin in a Marching Band was not a match made. Without any background in singing, Ms. Mullan entered the world of choir. During her time in Concert Choir, she taught herself the piano, some drums, and took guitar lessons to expand her aspirations. Upon developing her voice, she discovered that she was an operatic lyric soprano with at least eight octaves at her disposal. She sang in theater productions, graduations, and other activities from high school and throughout college.

DL Mullan received her music letter in high school. In addition, she has written music for competitions, competed in talent shows, won an award for her solo singing, as well as maintained her lyricist skills as an award-winning poet. With her classical training, as well as her grandfather's jazz pianist genes, both musical legacies will be reflected in her pieces.  

 

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Become an Undawntable

Keep up-to-date with everything Undawnted through Substack: Undawntable Newsletter. Join today! 

Undawnted's DL Mullan can be booked for your online Blog Tour, Book Event, Book Review (w/ARC), Interview, Writing Conference, or Genre Convention. Ms. Mullan has years of experience in public speaking, readings, present- ations, events, and tours.

Book a quality author and presenter with Undawnted: Bookings online form.

 

 

Saturday, April 5, 2025

Poetry Treasures 5: Small Pleasures Anthology Publishing DL Mullan's Original Works

Celebrate Poetry Month 

Poetry Treasures is a poetry anthology series by Robbie Cheadle (aka Roberta Eaton Cheadle) on Kaye Lynne Booth's Writing to be Read blogsite.

After realizing that I wrote poetry, Ms. Cheadle invited me into her select group: Treasuring Poetry, 2024: Introducing the poetry of DL Mullan and a review. With the culmination of a year's worth of poets, the fifth installment of her poetry anthology is set for publication this month.

Yours truly will be the first poet, since I was Ms. January 2024. Six of my poems will be available for perusal: Daybreak, Home, Myth, Quantum Time, Galactic Ride, and Slap-Happy Contagion. Each one brings a different perspective to the theme: Small Pleasures. 

Poetry Treasures Anthology on Undawnted.  

Poetry Treasures Poetry Slam on Undawnted's channel (Playlist).

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Song Release

Quantum Time is the inspiration for my song released on my self-titled: Undawnted album. 

Listen here and leave me your thoughts on my channel. 


Remember to Like, Comment, and Subscribe!

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Support Great Artists 


Poetry Treasures 5: Small Pleasures will be released on April 22, 2025. I hope everyone will have a chance to read the exceptional creative works therein. Every poet featured is a stellar rhythm-rhyme writer.


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Album Release

Ages instrumental album was inspired by DL Mullan's poems published in this anthology. 

This LP (long play) album's singles are available for listening via the Ages Playlist

For more information, or to read the song track titles, visit Ages Album & Singles on Undawnted.

 
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About the Poet

 
DL Mullan is much more than a lyrical and literary poet. Her elementary school taught Japanese theater and poetry, foreign languages, writing, cooking, drama, as well as drawing skills. Secondary education was an Arts Magnet High school, introducing her to the technical side of art through theater and concert choir. Everything a budding artist would need until community college filled her with a love for poetry. As a poet, she won academic awards and writing credits. Director of her own community poetry group, she presented, taught the love of poetry, as well as created her own poetic forms. During 2020, participants from around the world, including Europe and Asia, flocked to Undawnted to learn poetry from Ms. Mullan. Experience poetry in genres and styles that aren’t taught in the traditional English textbooks, but should be.

Ms. Mullan holds several college degrees, including a Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Studies, as well as a Masters of Arts in Teaching and Learning with Technology.

For more information about DL Mullan’s creative writing, digital art, poetry, music and more, visit http://www.undawnted.com.

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Become an Undawntable

 Keep up-to-date with everything Undawnted through Substack: Undawntable Newsletter. Join today!

Undawnted's DL Mullan can be booked for your online Blog Tour, Book Event, Book Review (w/ARC), Interview, Writing Conference, or Genre Convention. Ms. Mullan has years of experience in public speaking, readings, present- ations, events, and tours.

Book a quality author and presenter with Undawnted: Bookings online form.

 


Friday, June 7, 2024

Undawntech: Weaponized Technology for the Growing Mind is Available on Writing to be Read

Another delicious segment of Undawnted that fuses real world knowledge with the courage to tell truth to power is available.

Do you believe? Or, do you know? 

Undawnted's DL Mullan explores how technology can free and enslave depending on how it is used, as well as how creative thinkers, like writers, can weaponize their quantum, organic brain to outwit the dystopian power grabbers and make your imagination yours again.

Find out the epic citations and conclusion in June's installment of Undawntech: Weaponized Technology for the Growing Mind



Thursday, March 14, 2024

Undawnted Presents: a WordCrafter Blog Tour for Northtown Angelus by Robert T. White

On the path of great resistance, Raimo Jarvi, private investigator, searches for answers. Northtown authorities no only lack those answers, but empathy. Without anyone to turn to, P.I. Jarvi tries to discover what really happened to Johnny Dillon for his widow, Cora. With an angel on one shoulder and a devil on the other, will Raimo Jarvi succeed where others have failed? 

If you like crime-drama and private investigators, then Northtown Angelus is for you. Enjoy the dynamic characters and plot lines in this novel. 
 
Robert T. White offers readers an adventure of the mind and senses with his writing style. 
 
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Style in Crime Fiction, What Value?
Robert White

There are some words in the English-speaking world that can still stop conversation cold. Murder, Kill, Rape—to name three. Unfortunately, given the prominence of vulgarities in our society from top to bottom, one cannot even name the dreaded words that stand-up comedians alone risked using in public without fear of reprisal. The all-too-frequent f-bomb and most racial epithets still have clout but nothing like what they used to possess. Style is one of those ambiguous words that seem to have shed power and meaning rapidly in our time. Like “beauty,” style today is deemed to exist in the eye of the beholder. If you like Linda Fairstein’s or Lisa Scottoline’s fiction, you say that those authors have great style and you can point to the volumes that stretch from one end of a public library’s shelves to the other. “Count ‘em,” you say, and there’s your evidence. Or check the Times bestsellers list and there you find the usual suspects like James Patterson and Clive Cussler. 

At some point the notion of style as being more than personally argumentative becomes necessary if you are to be inclusive in your definition and you find yourself veering helplessly toward the metaphysical. If a physicist hands you a red ball and asks, “What color is it?” and your reply is immediately to say, “Red”; you feel the rightness of your response without demur. If that physicist places the ball in the yard at midnight and asks you the same question, can you so confidently answer “red” when you can’t see anything out there at all? 

That’s the problem with “style,” it seems to me. It becomes personal extremely fast and you are tempted to become overly assertive in your particular defense of the word. No one wants to go on record to say Shakespeare’s has no style. But how far would you get arguing for that lush Elizabethan prose in our slang-riddled, monosyllabic era? Is there a TikTok or Instagram influencer who doesn’t think everything is “awesome”? That word used to be restricted to quaking-before-the-throne-of-God circumstances only. Today it flutters from every teenager’s tongue. Not that word choice and word meanings are the essence of style. (I once read Roland Barthes’ analysis of Balzac’s Sarrasine, and I beg you, do not open up that can of structuralist worms.) 

So how do we get such a critical term away from the flotsam and jetsam of criteria that issue from personal subjectivity? Not for the sake of mere semantics but to get a better understanding of why certain writers from the dilettantish drabble writer through the pedantic critics and scholars with their weighty tomes to the writers we read for pleasure in all genres. There’s no yardstick I know of that applies in all cases and situations. 

A better way to start is by example. I recently came across a passage in Martin Cruz Smith’s Havana Bay who described the sluggish water flowing beneath a Moscow bridge in turgid brown folds. The imagery of that brief, incisive description stopped me short and it stays with me, even though I can’t quote the exact words he used. I remember savoring it before continuing. In fact, it’s a rare page of his in any novel that doesn’t have at least one example of that kind of striking blend of the familiar grappled to the exotic in such a way you know exactly where you are in time and space. Does that move the plot? Not incrementally but it holds you in the author’s grasp and, unlike so many bestsellers we could all name, doesn’t allow you to wander off to the next sentence or skip like a goat to keep the plot moving in your head. Less is more.

Smith’s ability to toss a passing glance like that, one of many taken by the seeing-eye narrator, held me in its grip throughout the novel and every one of his Renko books. The accretion of those diamond-sharp images hits some chord in the neocortex, or wherever delight comes into contact with cognition, that enables me to pass a value judgment: Damn, I say to myself, this guy is good . . . But assessing the great from the good and the good from the mediocre isn’t as formulaic as I and other readers would like it to be. There are so few descriptive references to Arkady Renko that you could cut-and-paste them in a paragraph: he’s too thin, smokes like a chimney, is dismissed by cretins and his enemies too easily, loves with passion. It’s not him we need; it’s the mind behind him. 

So, to sum up with a fatuous cliché, we know what we like, we say, to our opponents who champion other writers or, worse, are blind to the greatness in style we see so plainly. Shakespeare certainly had that, even though his contemporary Ben Jonson, who claimed to love him ”this side of idolatry,” wished his greater contemporary had revised “a thousand times” when told Shakespeare never revised a line of his plays. He didn’t like Shakespeare’s mixing of clowns and kings. He had a “magic touch” but he lacked “art.” 

When we talk about the contemporary murder mystery, we are talking more clowns than kings. But if “art” is to be equated with “style,” how can anyone claim that the best writers in the genre do not have it because they deal mainly with clowns/murderers? Of course, murderers can be well-spoken, possess degrees from an ivy league college, but those are minor features of killers and victims alike unless you insist on an all-egalitarian approach of killers, victims, and gumshoes alike. 

I can’t settle the argument but I can offer three criteria for a definition of good contemporary style across the board. My first criterion is simple: a writer can’t use ten words when one or two suffice. Second, a writer cannot violate the boundaries he or she establishes at the outset that include point of view’s restrictions on mind-hopping. 


When I first began reading the Henning Mankell series, I thought the translator had taken too much Ambien at night. Then I got hooked on the catalog of the mundane and the seemingly trivial. I couldn’t wait to grab my next Wallander volume from the shelves. My knowledge of Nordic crime-fiction writers is too thin to allow a comparison other than a brief contrast with the grim landscape in Stieg Larsson’s Millennium trilogy. (Note to David Fincher, director of Girl with the Dragon Tattoo: Casting Daniel Craig was not breaking a rule to avoid the awkward; it sacrificed verisimilitude for the bottom line.) Two hugely different styles albeit in translation from one language. 

Which brings me to that third rule about greatness in style, something I lifted from a freshman handbook on composition, The Elements of Style by William Strunk and E.B. White. simple word title: Style. It offered rules for everything in good writing and concluded with this rule, which I’m paraphrasing: “Break any rule rather than say something awkward.” It seems to me that the best writers know exactly where and when to break rules, when to follow them, and to do so in a way that creates their own unique signature as writers. Of one thing I am sure, no writer writes not to be read, no matter how skimpy, precious, or elitist the readership. All writers need it the way fish need oxygen passed through their gills. When I ran this essay through the grammar checker, it told me to eliminate a couple uses of “very,” which I did. I did, however, draw the line at ejecting “flotsam and jetsam” for the substituted “miscellaneous items.” There’s a hill I’ll die on. Jonson was right about Shakespeare: he had the magic touch. He could make you see a red ball in a black night.

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Giveaway

Each stop where you leave a comment,

you get another chance to win one of five digital copies,

and one signed print copy of Northtown Angelus.

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Author Bio

Robert T. White writes from Northeastern Ohio. He has published several crime, noir, hardboiled novels and genre stories in various magazines and anthologies. He’s been nominated for a Derringer. “Inside Man,” a crime story, was selected for Best American Mystery Stories 2019. His second hardboiled p.i. series (after the Thomas Haftmann mysteries begun in 2011 with Haftmann's Rules) features Raimo Jarvi in Northtown Eclipse (Fahrenheit Press, 2018) and Northtown Blitz (2020). British website Murder, Mayhem & More cited When You Run with Wolves (rpt. 2018) as a finalist for Top Ten Crime Books of 2018 and Perfect Killer in 2019. “If I Let You Get Me” was selected for the Bouchercon 2019 anthology and The Russian Heist (Moonshine Cove, 2019), another crime thriller, was selected by Thriller Magazine as winner of its Best Novel category. "Out of Breath" and Other Stories is a mixed collection of mainstream and noir fiction (Red Giant Press, 2013). 

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Undawnted's DL Mullan can be booked for your online Blog Tour, Book Event, Book Review (w/ARC), Interview, Writing Conference, or Genre Convention. Ms. Mullan has years of experience in public speaking, readings, presentations, events, and tours.

Book a quality author and presenter with Undawnted: Bookings online form
 


Wednesday, January 17, 2024

Extra Extra! The Descent is a Horrorific Good Read

Genre poetry, especially The Descent's: darker breed of poetry, is often overlooked by poetry lovers. This Autumn Cider Seasonal Reads staple here on Undawnted is a great way to vibe with the change of seasons.

On Writing to be Read's Treasuring Poetry column by Robbie Cheadle, she not only delves into my Edgar Allan Poe, Emily Dickinson, paranormal inspired chapbook, but she enjoyed it as well.

Treasuring Poetry, 2024: Introducing the poetry of DL Mullan and a review is available to read. In this interview, I discuss my inspiration and journey into writing poetry. The classics are a beautiful influence and help me ground my creative pieces. My interview also exhibits three poems from other chapbooks. Transcendence is in my upcoming Impetus. The Flower Within lives in Effloresce, which is being expanded for a future release. Weather and Asymptote reside in Phantastic.

I hope poetry lovers read my upcoming chapbooks as I re-release these poetry books from one platform onto another. This year, I plan on publishing at least two chapbooks, Eclipse being one of them. I cannot wait to share my lyrical visions with an expanded audience. 

My Long Form Poetry will be published in an upcoming collection, but most individual poems are available in my Special Editions Store.

Thanks again, Robbie Cheadle, for your kindness and review of my poetry. 

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Support Great Artists 

 
Purchase your copy from our fine retailers: 




 

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DL Mullan has been writing award-level poetry for thirty years. Recently, she has showcased her literary talents by self-publishing several collections of her poetry. She also writes novels, designs apparel, and creates digital art. Ms. Mullan‘s creative writing is available in digital and print collections, from academia to commercial anthologies.

As an independent publisher, she produces her own book cover designs and video presentations, as well as maintains her own websites. She is an award-winning digital artist and poet. 

Join her Undawntable Newsletter for everything Undawnted. Be sure to enroll in her Substack writing program, RhymeScribe, which focuses on the form and function of poetry. Become a YouTube subscriber for her Poetry Slam updates.

http://www.undawnted.com

http://www.undawnted.com/p/poetry.html  

http://www.undawnted.com/p/long-form-poetry.html


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