Delaune Michel

Music Muddy Waters, early REM, Bill Monroe, Rolling Stones, Glen Gould, Prince, Pearl Jam, Patti Smith, Fats Waller, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers especially Benmont Tench, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Lucinda Williams, Led Zeppelin, Aimee Mann, Nirvana, Bessie Smith, Grateful Dead, Satchmo, Johnny Cash, P Funk, the Ramones, and "it's a small world after all" sung by my four year old.

or authors I love: John Banville, Flannery O'Connor, James Ellroy, Joan Didion, anyone with the last name Dubus or Burke, especially the ones I'm related to, Bruce Wagner, Arthur Phillips, Dani Shapiro, ee cummings, Richard Yates, Milan Kundera, Pema Chodrun, PD James, Michael Connelly, Chekhov, Tennessee Williams, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Raymond Chandler, Hubert "Cubby" Selby, Martin Amis, T.S. Eliot, Ha Jin, Edna O'Brien, Richard Ford, Walker Percy, Alice Munro, Anita Brookner, Robert Crais, T. Jefferson Parker, Kevin Young, Jean Rhys, Shakespeare, Tolstoy, Mary Karr, Bill Buford, Elizabeth Kolbert, Adam Gopnik, Kazuo Ishiguro, Dave Eggars, Carl Hiaasen, Natalie Angier, Yeats, Oscar Wilde, Shaw, Thomas Mann, Steinbeck, Brecht, Pablo Neruda, Harold Pinter, Jhumpa Lahiri, Junot Diaz, John Kennedy Toole, Norman Mailer, William Styron, Faulkner, Truman Capote, D.H. Lawrence, Salinger, Carson McCullers, Edith Wharton, Willa Cather, James M. Cain, and for my sons: Sandra Boynton, Eric Carle, Dr. Seuss, and anything about trucks- who knew backhoe loaders were so cool?

Boogie Nights, Seven Samurai, 400 Blows, Paper Moon, O Brother Where Art Thou?, The Thin Man, Far From Heaven, Traffic, O, Five Easy Pieces, The Shining, The Pianist, Rosemary's Baby, Klute, The Others, Devil's Backbone, Dead Man Walking, Bowfinger, Liar Liar, No Country for Old Men, There Will Be Blood, Reds, Interiors, Crash, Syriana, the Graduate, Brokeback Mountain, Scarface, Good Fellas, Under the Sand, The Swimming Pool, Match Point, Drugstore Cowboy, No Direction Home: Bob Dylan, The Departed, Gosford Park, Best in Show, Sideways, Alien, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Buffalo '66, Y Tu Mama Tambian, Being John Malkovich, The Big Lebowski, Breaking the Waves, A Fish Called Wanda, Groundhog Day, Raging Bull, Sex, Lies, and Videotape, The Ice Storm, A Simple Plan, Dogtown and Z-Boys, Election, Dr. Strangelove, Spirited Away, The Last Emporer, The Sweet Hereafter, Chinatown, Sling Blade, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.

Extras, Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Larry Sanders Show, Meet the Press, Charlie Rose, The Sopranos, Laker games - though I guess I should like the Knicks now that I live in NY, but who are we kidding?, and TIVO for finding movies to watch.

going to the park or the zoo or aquarium with my sons, writing, reading, running, Ashtanga yoga, boxing (watching the pros, especially Roy Jones, Jr., and hitting the heavy bag myself - supposedly I have a mean right hook, but I wouldn't be scared of me in the dark), meditating, interior design or as my husband says, are you changing that again?, throwing parties, dancing for hours, the South (especially South Louisiana, the Florida panhandle, and the I-10 drive between them), City Ballet, crossword puzzles with my husband, and the last great drug, sleep.

my religion is kindness

I didn't go to college. I studied acting and theatre in NYC with teachers from The Actor's Studio, The Neighborhood Playhouse, and Juillard.

Saint Joseph's Academy in Baton Rouge, Louisiana

www.delaunemichel.com, http://www.harpercollins.com/authors/29461/index.aspx