Saturday Writers' Clinic

Stephen Rea, author of the critically acclaimed Katrina memoir Finn McCool’s Football Club, will lead two sessions at the September edition of the Saturday Writer’s Clinic beginning at 9:30 a.m., Saturday. Sept. 21, at the East Bank Regional Library, 4747 W. Napoleon, Metairie. 

This event is free of charge and is open to the public. There is no registration.

9:30 a.m. – Mistakes Every Writer Makes

Are you taking too long to get to the story? Are you waffling your way through weak writing instead of being strong and direct? Is your dialogue clunky and forced? All aspiring writers make the same mistakes. I've edited hundreds of stories, and every time I read a new author, I can guess what they are going to do wrong before reading the opening paragraph. Learn what the common mistakes are, and discover how to fix them.

11 a.m. – Life as a Writer, Amateur or Professional

You've written the great American novel - how do you sell it? You spent a decade crafting your grandmother's memoir - should you self-publish it? How do you carve out time to write when you have a full-time job? What's it like to deal with a New York agent or an editor at a big publishing house? In this session, we will talk about how the publishing industry works, and leave extra time to answer your questions. 

Stephen Rea has been teaching writing since 2011. He ran the Walker Percy Center at Loyola University, then set up his own classes. A former writer for national newspapers in the UK, he has been to 112 countries, all seven continents, and all 50 U.S. states. Born in Belfast, he spent his childhood against the backdrop of bombings and shootings during the seventies and eighties. At 16, he went on tour with rock star Ozzy Osbourne and traveled the world as his assistant road manager, contributing a chapter to Osbourne's biography Diary of a Madman. He lives, writes and teaches in New Orleans.