What happens when duty to family threatens to strangle your artistic ambition?

Author

Mark LaFlaur, a Louisiana native, is a writer and editor in New York City. He has written for The Village Voice, The American Scholar, and Los Angeles Times Book Review, and blogs at Levees Not War. Learn More

Fiction

New Orleans, 1999. A young would-be poet is torn between family obligations (ailing mother, volatile brother) and his dream of moving to San Francisco to become a real poet. Learn More

Nonfiction

What Fresh Hell? brings together 10 years of blogging on war and peace, politics and society, infrastructure, and the environment in a time of extreme weather. Learn More
In the News

What Fresh Hell? The Best of Levees Not War, 2005–2015, is published on August 29, 2015, the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina.

Mark is interviewed by The Anthology of Louisiana Literature (on iTunes). See Publicity for more.

Elysian Fields named to Kirkus Reviews’ Best of 2013.

Elysian Fields wins rare “double crown” of *two starred reviews*—first from Publishers Weekly and now from the very hard-to-impress Kirkus Reviews.

Check out the Publishers Weekly starred review of Elysian Fields.

Check out Mark LaFlaur’s blog Levees Not War.