Based on the murder of nineteen children and two teachers in the Robb Elementary School shooting, The Mural explores themes of violent radicalism, generational trauma, cancel culture, and the healing power of art through the experiences of a muralist and his lover.He shot Granny in the face then murdered nineteen children and two teachers at Grape Valley Elementary School in far West Texas. So begins The Mural, Pulitzer-nominated war correspondent and author Sid Balman’s fictional ...

The US and Europe have unraveled since World War II and radicalism has metastasized into every community, tearing away the decency, optimism, and security that shaped those robust democracies for more than eight decades. No place is immune, including the small West Texas town of Dell City, where four generations of an iconic American family and a Syrian Muslim family carve a farming empire out of the unforgiving high desert.These families’ partnership is as unlikely as the idea of ...