“I wanna be the minority. I don’t need your authority. Down with the moral majority, cause I wanna be the minority.” Billie Joe Armstrong, Green Day Sophomore year of high school, which would’ve been 1990, I started buying a Martin Luther King Jr. button from the lady at the Chevron station every January. She literallyContinue reading “Racing Towards Boring”
Author Archives: New Bayou Books
Stuck in the Middle with You
A guest blog from Toby Leblanc, author of Dark Roux. Hi friends. I’m proud to bring you a guest appearance from my new friend and emerging South Louisiana author, Toby Leblanc. Jason P. Reed My first memories of stories were not of their beginnings and endings, but the way they were told. My mother wouldContinue reading “Stuck in the Middle with You”
Declaring Independence
Fast forward a few years and the buzz words arrived, as did the love affair with race and white guilt and all the other virtual signaling mumbo jumbo rich white people never shut up about. That’s how rich white people stopped being cool. Someone convinced them that being rich and white is bad and nowContinue reading “Declaring Independence”
What I Want to Read
It starts, for me, with the narrator. As a reader, I need to feel like I’m in good hands with the narrator. And that confidence needs to be established right from the get-go. In the opening paragraphs, I want the narrator to take me firmly by the hand and say “come with me . .Continue reading “What I Want to Read”
Talking Blues
A great story is a microcosm of humanity. A wise, accomplished writer with three names told me that recently. Call it a universal truth. I’ve been thinking about this in the context of New Bayou Books. In the context of South Louisiana literature. What I’m up to with the company is trying to tease outContinue reading “Talking Blues”
The Rising Tide in South Louisiana
I have to admit, it’s a strange and wonderful thing to hear podcasters, journalists, writers, and librarians repeating the phrase “a renaissance in South Louisiana literature” back to me. It’s something I’ve written and said hundreds of times over the last couple years, but there’s a special power in the words when other people speakContinue reading “The Rising Tide in South Louisiana “
Lessons Learned From My First Podcast
I’m in the middle of cooking dinner, and so I need to make this short. Lucky you. Still, I do have value to offer my nameless brethren out there in the early stages of building a creative enterprise. Everybody has a first podcast. And Jan Swift, host of the Discover Lafayette, was my first. IfContinue reading “Lessons Learned From My First Podcast”
Telling Stories
Over the weekend I converted a broom closet in our house to a little voice recording studio. By converted I mean I took all the random crap out of the room and hung a rug over the door. Works like a charm, actually. The re-purposed room is a part of my decision to buckle downContinue reading “Telling Stories”
Let the Good Times Roll!A Record of Outreach & Engagement in Acadiana
A Strange Kind of Symmetry. I don’t know what it’s like to write about South Louisiana from inside the state. It was 1999 when I started writing The Broad Stroke, my still unpublished first novel set on a fictitious version of the very real college campus that people now call the University of LouisianaContinue reading “Let the Good Times Roll!A Record of Outreach & Engagement in Acadiana“
Standing Up to the Sick Lure of Stand Up
“You can’t just go out there and put it in their ass.” Joey Diaz giving stand up advice to Eddie Bravo Among the handful of public engagements I had in Acadiana this October, the four-ish minutes I spent on stage for open mic night at the Jefferson Street Pub were the most intense. The thingContinue reading “Standing Up to the Sick Lure of Stand Up”
New Bayou Books 