DeLaune Michel

DeLauné Michel is an award-winning writer and actress. She was raised in South Louisiana in a literary family with over 10 published writers in two generations, including her late uncle André Dubus (In the Bedroom) her mother Elizabeth Nell Dubus, and her cousins André Dubus (House of Sand and Fog) and James Lee Burke (New York Times best-selling mystery writer). Michel is the author of the novels Aftermath of Dreaming (William Morrow) and The Safety of Secrets (Avon).

Ms. Michel was named for Helene DeLauné, the first woman over from France on her mother’s side.  Helene DeLauné was in the court of Marie Antoinette and her husband, Jules André, fought in the French Revolution. Marie Antoinette gave Helene DeLauné jewels to help her and her husband escape to South Louisiana. Ms. Michel’s father’s family was the eleventh family in New Orleans.

Michel moved to New York City upon leaving high school. She was a model there and in Europe, and then spent several years studying acting with teachers from the Neighborhood Playhouse, The Actor’s Studio, Juilliard, and the Yale Drama School. Michel had guest starring roles on TV shows such as NYPD Blue, The Gilmore Girls, and Judging Amy, among others.

In 1996, Michel created Spoken Interludes (www.spokeninterludes.com), a critically-acclaimed reading series where award-winning, best-selling, and up-coming writers read their own work. In 2001, she made it a non-profit arts organization through which she developed, taught in, and continues to run out-reach writing programs for at-risk teenagers in Los Angeles public high schools and detention halls. The Spoken Interludes reading series has been heard on National Pubic Radio and continues to have readings in Los Angeles and New York.

The first two short stories that Michel wrote won recognition in the Thomas Wolfe Short Fiction Competition sponsored by Duke University. Later work won the Pacificus Foundation Literary Award.  One of her short stories caught the eye of an agent, who then sent it to Joyce Carol Oates. Oates called Michel’s writing “a wonderful, idiosyncratic voice and an extremely promising talent.”  But Oates felt that the story was actually a chapter of a novel. Michel agreed and her first novel, Aftermath of Dreaming, was born.

In Aftermath of Dreaming, Michel explores with humor and pathos the universal themes of abandonment, forgiveness, and letting go. The novel is loosely based on an intimate six-year relationship she shared with Warren Beatty. The Safety of Secrets explores the friendship of two actresses, friends since childhood, as they navigate the rocky roads of their careers and families.

Michel lives in Westchester County, New York with her husband and two sons. She is currently working on her third novel.

Writing from the School of Life: How Not Getting an MFA (much less going to college) Taught Me to Write

But How Much is True? Navigating the Thorny Path of “Fact” Based Fiction

Growing Up Writing: How Growing Up in a Family of Writers Shaped My Life

Being Heard: Getting Your Story On the Page and Out in the World