Today is the final stop on the WordCrafter Shadow Blade Book Blog Tour. We’re wrapping up the tour tonight with a live appearance by author Chris Barili, where you can ask him questions about the book and the Denari Lai universe. If you are following the tour and want to get in on the giveaway, comment or ask a question at the event or on the blog. (Details below)
Meet Author Chris Barili
Tonight only, from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m., join author Chris Barili in a Facebook Live event, where you can chat with him, ask questions about the books or the series in general. Join in the fun by clicking on the link below.
Currently oppressed by his day job, Chris has set sights on retiring after 42 years in the Intelligence Community and writing full-time. Chris Barili writes all kinds of stories, and has published fantasy, science fiction, horror, western, paranormal romance, and most recently crime, with a noir story in the inaugural print edition of Toe Six Magazine. He is author of the self-published, weird western Hell’s Butcher series, and also writes under the pen names B.T. Clearwater (Supernatural romance) and T.C. Barlow (western). Chris is a retired intelligence officer, having served over 45 years between active duty, contractor, and government employee roles. He lives in Colorado with his wife.
About Shadow Blade
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?
That’s about it for the WordCrafter Shadow Blade Book Blog Tour. I hope you have enjoyed meeting Chris and learning about this stealthy fantasy romance adventure. Be sure to pop over to the live event tonight, at the link above and chat with Chris. He’ll be there live to answer all your questions or just shoot the shit.
One thing we weren’t able to get in time for the tour were reviews. We had a tight time schedule for this one and the reviews haven’t come in yet. But if you’re interested in seeing a review, I reviewed the story when it was released by WordFire Press and you can read my review here.
And don’t forget to leave your comments. Each stop you visit and comment on gets you an entry in the giveaway. If you missed a stop, you can go back and visit by clicking on the links in the tour schedule below. For tonight’s event, you can come back here and comment if you like, but if you participate in the chat with Chris, that counts, too. WordCrafter has never done a live event like this before, so I’m anxious to see how it turns out. Any thoughts on would be appreciated.
Thanks for joining us in this re-launch of Shadow Blade. Remember, there’s a free copy of Baiting the Hook when you purchase the WordCrafter Press edition of the book, so what are you waiting for?
Picture Caption: WordCrafter Poetry Treasures 5: Small Pleasures Tour Banner
We’re wrapping up the WordCrafter Poetry Treasures 5: Small Pleasures Book Blog Tour. We’ve had a great tour this past week and I hope you all visited each stop and left a comment for a chance to win one of three digital copies of Poetry Treasures 5 in our giveaway. If you missed a stop or joined us late, you can still go back and meet more poets featured in the anthology, but the giveaway ends tonight, so get your comments in now.
I want to thank contributors Michelle Ayon Navajas, Dawn Pisturino, Barbara Harris Leonard, Ivor Steven, and DL Mullen for their participation in the tour. And thanks also goes out to the hosts for this tour: Colleen Chesebro of ColleenWrites & Publishes, Patty Fletcher of Patty’s Worlds, Carla Johnson-Hicks of Carla Loves to Read, Michelle Navajas of Poetry by Mich, Kay Castenada of Book Places, and DL Mullen of Un dawnted. I feel everyone did a great job and it is appreciated.
I’d like to.make this stop a celebration of the author/poets who contributed to the anthology-those who shared their work on the tour and those who weren’t able to join us. They are all talented poets, and I feel fortunate to feature their lovely works in a WordCrafter poetry anthology.
Tour Schedule
April 21-28 – Poetry Treasures 5: Small Pleasures, by Kaye Lynne Booth, et.al.
Today we have a double stop. Along with the final stop here, we have DL Mullen interviewing Dawn Pisturino over at Un dawnted. You can’t comment on that site, but you can leave your comments for DL and Dawn here. And here on Writing to be Read, I’ll be introducing you to the contributing poets who did not provide content for the tour. Their valuable contributions to the anthology are not to be overlooked, for it was a group effort that made this anthology such an exceptional collection of poetry.
About Poetry Treasures 5: Simple Pleasures
Open the cover
and you will discover
Poetry Treasures
from the guests on
Robbie Cheadle’s 2024
“Treasuring Poetry”
blog series
on Writing to be Read.
Join poets DL Mullan, Barbara Harris Leonhard, Jude Itakali, Ivor Steven, Robbie Cheadle, Michelle Ayon Navajas, Gwen M. Plano, Elizabeth Gauffreau, David Bogomolny, Dawn Pasturino, Maggie Watson, and Colleen Chesebro share their own small pleasures in poetic verse.
This tour we’re giving away digital copies of Poetry Treasures 5: Small Pleasures to three lucky winners. Follow the tour and comment at each stop, so we’ll know you were there. You’ll be entered for another chance in the giveaway at each stop. Winners are chosen through a random drawing by WordCrafter Press. Winners will be announce in tomorrow’s “WordCrafter News”.
That’s it for today’s stop on Writing to be Read. Be sure to visit the second part of this double stop over at Un dawnted, where DL Mullan is interviewing author/contributor Dawn Pisturino. I hope you enjoyed the tour and the poetry samples shared enough to get you to buy the book. By using the Books2Read UBL, above, you can purchase from your favorite distributor around the world. Be sure to drop by and catch tomorrow’s “WordCrafter News”, here on Writing to be Read, to find out who the winners in the giveaway are.
Picture Caption: WordCrafter Poetry Treasures 5: Small Pleasures Tour Banner
Welcome to the WordCrafter Poetry Treasures 5: Small Pleasures Book Blog Tour. We have a great tour planned, and I hope you all will stick with us and visit each stop, because comments at each stop enters you for another chance to win one of three digital copies of Poetry Treasures 5 in our giveaway. We’ve got guest posts from from contributors Michelle Ayon Navajas and Dawn Pisturino, readings from Barbara Harris Leonhard, Ivor Steven, and DL Mullen, and a special interview with Dawn Pisturino. Plus you may find a couple of early reviews from our wonderful tour hosts. So please join us and follow along on the schedule below to learn more about this outstanding poetry anthology and enjoy a few Small Pleasures.
Tour Schedule
April 21-28 – Poetry Treasures 5: Small Pleasures, by Kaye Lynne Booth, et.al.
Mon. 4/21 – Opening Day- Writing to be Read – (Intro. post & Book Trailer)
Join poets DL Mullan, Barbara Harris Leonhard, Jude Itakali, Ivor Steven, Robbie Cheadle, Michelle Ayon Navajas, Gwen M. Plano, Elizabeth Gauffreau, David Bogomolny, Dawn Pasturino, Maggie Watson, and Colleen Chesebro share their own small pleasures in poetic verse.
This tour we’re giving away digital copies of Poetry Treasures 5: Small Pleasures to three lucky winners. Follow the tour and comment at each stop, so we’ll know you were there. You’ll be entered for another chance in the giveaway at each stop. Winners are chosen through a random drawing by WordCrafter Press. We’ll be watching for your name.
Book Trailer
A special thanks goes out to Teagan Genevieve for our lovely book trailer. Thank you so much Teagan.
About the Editors
You will meet some of the contributors along the way on this tour, but in this opening day post, I’d like ton tell you a little about the editors who put this project together and made it happen. I also thought it might be interesting to share a brief glimpse of what goes on behind the scenes when putting together a poetry anthology, which I hope you’ll find of interest.
Kaye Lynne Booth
For Kaye Lynne Booth, writing is a passion. Kaye Lynne is an author with published short fiction and poetry, both online and in print, including her short story collection, Last Call and Other Short Fiction; and her paranormal mystery novella, Hidden Secrets; Books 1 & 2 of her Women in the West adventure series, Delilah and Sarah, and her Time-Travel Adventure novel, The Rock Star & The Outlaw,as well as her poetry collection, Small Wonders and The D.I.Y. Author writing resource. Kaye holds a dual M.F.A. degree in Creative Writing with emphasis in genre fiction and screenwriting, and an M.A. in publishing. Kaye Lynne is the founder of WordCrafter Quality Writing & Author Services and WordCrafter Press. She also maintains an authors’ blog and website, Writing to be Read, where she publishes content of interest in the literary world.
My job is to edit the final manuscript, format and publish it. I find poetry to be a personal endeavor, so I do very little editing of the actual poems for fear of changing the poet’s meaning, since poetry often does not follow the rules of grammar and punctuation which apply to the English language. In addition, we have poets from all over the globe included in the anthology, which makes for variation in style and differences in spellings, so I pretty much leave the poetry as is unless it is something I know is a typo or mistaken word.
But the person who truly makes this anthology possible is my co-editor, Robbie Cheadle, who finds and schedules poets to be interviewed on the “Treasuring Poetry” blog series on Writing to be Read. It is Robbie who selects and interviews each poet, and she usually reviews their latest release, as well. Then, at the end of the year, Robbie sends out invitations to the anthology and collects and compiles all the materials into a manuscript before turning it over to me. Without Robbie to do all of the preliminary work, there would not be any Poetry Treasures Anthologies. I couldn’t do it without her.
Robbie Cheadle
South African author and illustrator, Robbie Cheadle, has written and illustrated sixteen children’s books, illustrated a further three children’s books, and written and illustrated three poetry books. Her work has also appeared in poetry and short story anthologies.
Robbie also has two novels and a collection of short stories published under the name of Roberta Eaton Cheadle and has horror, paranormal, and fantasy short stories featured in several anthologies under this name.
You can find Robbie Cheadle’s artwork, fondant and cake artwork, and all her books on her website here: https://www.robbiecheadle.co.za/
That’s it for today’s stop. I hope I gave you enough of a taste of this delectable poetry anthology to make you want to sample more. There are several more tasty morsels from then contributing authors along the way. Join us tomorrow, on Colleen Writes & Publishes, where author/poet Dawn Pisturino will share a guest post and poetry from Poetry Treasures 5: Small Pleasures.
We had a great tour for the release of Midnight Garden: Where Dark Tales Grow and now it’s time to announce who the lucky winners of the giveaway are.
And the winners are…
(Drum roll please)
Chris Hall
Annette Rochelle Aben
Gwen M. Plano
Congratulations ladies, and thank you for following the WordCrafter Midnight Garden Book Blog Tour. Your support is appreciated and I know you will enjoy this dark story collection. Happy reading!
This is the final stop on the WordCrafter Midnight Garden Book Blog Tour and we’re wrapping up with a guest post by contributing author Joseph Carrabis about the inspiration of his story, “The Tomb” and a reading of his story “The Exchange”, which are both featured in this deliciously dark anthology, Midnight Garden: Where Dark Tales Grow.
About Midnight Garden: Where Dark Tales Grow
17 authors bring you 21 magnificent dark tales. Stories of magic, monsters and mayhem. Tales of murder and madness which will make your skin crawl. These are the tales that explore your darkest Midnight Garden… if you dare.
The Tomb was originally written in the late 1970s. and no one was interested in it. What you read is the last major edit, circa 2011. The original version – and much of what’s in the published version – came from a dream.
The story is personal to me as I was blind – technically “limited eyesight” and legally blind – until about four years ago. I was considered for some experimental surgeries back in the late 1970s and one thing or another dropped me from consideration. Finally, in 2020 – yep, the year of Covid – Technology caught up to what I needed it to be and several operations later, I can see.
In case you’re curious, going from an auditory landscape to a visual one is not easy. Susan (wife/partner/Princess) got a chuckle out of my staring at something while I matched what it looked like to the sound it made (and which I recognized).
The story itself deals with the fact that “seeing” means seeing everything, some of which isn’t pretty, and some, which others might consider ugly or horrid, is beautiful simply because it can be seen.
About Author Joseph Carrabis
Joseph Carrabis told stories to anyone who would listen starting in childhood, wrote his first stories in grade school, and started getting paid for his writing in 1978. He’s been everything from a long-haul trucker to a Chief Research Scientist and holds patents covering mathematics, anthropology, neuroscience, and linguistics. After patenting a technology which he created in his basement and creating an international company, he retired from corporate life and now he spends his time writing fiction based on his experiences. His work appears regularly in several anthologies and his own published novels. You can learn more about him at https://josephcarrabis.com.
Excerpt From “The Puppet Men”
Excerpt From “Self-Mutiny”, by Zack Ellafy
Giveaway
Three lucky winners will receive a digital copy of Midnight Garden in a random drawing following the tour. All you have to do to enter is follow the tour and leave a comment at each stop that you visit. If you missed a stop, you can go back and visit through the links in the schedule below.
Schedule
Monday – October 7 – M.J. Mallon: Interview & Reading from “The Seagull Man” – Writing to be Read
Tuesday – October 8 – Danaeka Scrimshaw: Inspiration for “The Fae Game”) & Denise Aparo: Reading from “Jack Moon & the Vanishing Book” – Roberta Writes
Wednesday – October 9 – Joseph Carrabis: Reading of “The Last Drop” & Inspiration for “Striders” – Paul Martz
Thursday – October 10 – Paul Martz: Reading & Inspiration for “The Blackest Ink” – Writing to be Read
Friday – October 11 – Molly Ertel: Inspiration for “Antipenultimate” & Abe Margel: Inspiration for “My Balance” – Kyrosmagica
Saturday – October 12 – Paul Kane: Inspiration for “Drip Feed” & Joseph Carrabis: Reading of “Grande Ture” – Undawnted
Sunday – October 13 – DL Mullan: Reading from “Kurst” & Ell Rodman: Inspiration for “The Drummer” –BookPlaces
Monday – October 14 – Joseph Carrabis: Reading of “The Exchange” & Inspiration for “The Tomb” – Writing to be Read
Join us over at BookPlaces for Day 7 of the Wordcrafter Midnight Garden Book Blog Tour where cobtributing authors DL Mullan and Ell Rodman share their inspiration for their stories, “Kurst” and “The Drummer”, and another chance to win a free digital copy of Midnight Garden: Where Dark Tales Grow.
Today we’re over at Undawnted for Day 6 of the WordCrafter Midnight Garden Book Blog Tour with the inspiration for contributing author Paul Kane’s story, “Drip Feed” and a reading of “Grande Ture” by Joseph Carrabis. Drop by and comment here for a chance to win a free digital copy of Midnight Garden: Where Dark Tales Grow.
Today we’re over at Kyrosmagica for Day 5 of the WordCrafter Midnight Garden Book Blog Tour with contributing authors Abe Margel and Molly Ertel share the inspirations for their stories “My Balance” and “Antepenultimate”. Join us and get a chance to win a free digital copy of Midnight Garden: Where Dark Tales Grow.
Welcome to Day 5 of the WordCrafter Midnight Garden Book Blog Tour. Thanks for dropping by to help us send off this deliciously dark anthology, Midnight Garden: Where Dark Tales Grow. Today we have a guest post and a reading of “The Blackest Ink” from contributing author, Paul Martz, which I think you’ll enjoy.
Giveaway
Three lucky winners will receive a digital copy of Midnight Garden in a random drawing following the tour. All you have to do to enter is follow the tour and leave a comment at each stop that you visit.
If you miss a stop, you can go back and visit through the links in the schedule below. (Links won’t work until the stop goes live).
Schedule
Monday – October 7 – M.J. Mallon: Interview & Reading from “The Seagull Man” – Writing to be Read
Tuesday – October 8 – Danaeka Scrimshaw: Inspiration for “The Fae Game” & Denise Aparo: Reading from “Jack Moon & the Vanishing Book” – Roberta Writes
Wednesday – October 9 – Joseph Carrabis: Reading of “The Last Drop” & Inspiration for “Striders” – Paul Martz
Thursday – October 10 – Paul Martz: Reading & Inspiration for “The Blackest Ink” – Writing to be Read
Friday – October 11 – Molly Ertel: Inspiration for “Antipenultimate” & Abe Margel: Inspiration for “My Balance” – Kyrosmagica
Saturday – October 12 – Paul Kane: Inspiration for “Drip Feed” & Joseph Carrabis: Reading of “Grande Ture” – Undawnted
Sunday – October 13 – DL Mullan: Reading from “Kurst” & Ell Rodman: Inspiration for “The Drummer” –BookPlaces
Monday – October 14 – Joseph Carrabis: Reading of “The Exchange” & Inspiration for “The Tomb” – Writing to be Read
About Midnight Garden: Where Dark Tales Grow
17 authors bring you 21 magnificent dark tales. Stories of magic, monsters and mayhem. Tales of murder and madness which will make your skin crawl. These are the tales that explore your darkest Midnight Garden… if you dare.
“The Blackest Ink” is a tale of unrequited love set in future Istanbul. Abdul is an apprentice to the master calligrapher Zolia, who has perfected a lettercraft so beautiful that it imbues inanimate objects with life. When Abdul awkwardly expresses his love for Zolia, she rebuffs him, and the story unfolds from there.
The story had its genesis in this MIT research article. Entirely by chance, researchers had discovered an exceptionally black material that absorbs 99.995% of all incoming light. The material was made from carbon nanotubes, which are atomic-scale tubes constructed from carbon atoms. The article resonated with me. I’d been fascinated with structures built from carbon atoms since a post-grad neighbor brought me a sample of graphene from his lab. I imagined carbon nanotubes as a kind of atomic siphon. I couldn’t help but wonder, where did the light go? If carbon nanotubes absorb light, what else might they absorb? Souls? Emotions? Reality?
And–if they were used as a pigment to make ink, how black would it be?
I was thrilled to learn that “The Blackest Ink” was a runner-up in Wordcrafter’s 2024 Short Fiction contest, and look forward to reading every dark tale that grows in Midnight Garden.
Reading Excerpt from “The Blackest Ink”, by Paul Martz
Excerpt From “Black Moon”, by Julie Jones
Excerpt From “Amahle’s Demon”, by Roberta Eaton Cheadle
Today we’re over at the Paul Martz blog site for Day 3 of the Midnight Garden Book Blog Tour with contributing author, Joseph Carrabis, sharing his inspiration for “Striders” and a reading of “The Last Drop”. Join us to get a small sampling of the deliciously dark stories featured in Midnight Garden: Where Dark Tales Grow and a chance to win a free digital copy.