Water Street Writers is a curated reading series celebrating local authors from the suburbs of Chicago.

Join us four precious Sundays a year — one each season — generally in September, November, February, and April.

Our next gathering is Sunday, September 27.
Doors open at 5:00 PM | Reading begins at 5:30 PM
And stick around afterward for an Open Mic!

Each event features four readers performing their original short works of prose and poetry. We welcome all genres, styles, and kinds of performance.

Our generous hosts at Water Street Studios have donated their beautiful space for the series. We encourage everyone to support them by becoming a member and coming out for their Second Friday art openings — they’re always a good time.

Want to read with us?
Readers are selected by submission. Send us your best work at WaterStreetWriters@rolreadlocal.com.

Come listen. Come read. Come be part of the local literary community.

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September 27th

Laurie O’Connor Stephan’s creative writing began with her participation in a local cable access competition, followed by entering prompted writing contests. By day, she works at a law firm. By night (when not fighting crime), she exercises her writing muscles in favor of the real ones. Most of her fiction features humor and twist endings, while she observes real life on the pages of her blog, We B Late.

David W. Berner is an acclaimed author of fiction, creative nonfiction, memoir, short stories, and poetry. His writing space is inside an 8×10 shed on the property of his Midwest home, a shed modeled after Dylan Thomas’ famous boathouse shed in Laugharne, Wales. 

He is the author of several award-winning books of prose and poetry, and is currently the Poet Laureate of Clarendon Hills, IL (2026-2028) His work has been honored by the Chicago Writers Association, the Eric Hoffer Award, the Society of Midland Authors, the National and Association of Independent Writers and Editors, to name a few.

David also has been privileged to serve as the Writer-in-Residence at the Jack Kerouac Project in Orlando, Florida and at the Ernest Hemingway Birthplace Home and Museum in Oak Park, IL.

David shares a home with his wife, Leslie, and dog, Sam, outside Chicago in Clarendon Hills, IL.

Hallie Koontz is a freelance writer and editor based in the Chicagoland area. She graduated from Cornell College (Mount Vernon, Iowa) with a degree in English & Creative Writing, departmental honors, the Winifred Van Etten Award for Creativity and Scholarship in the Department, and the Tom Garst Award for Academic Writing. Her short fiction has been published in the Macguffin, and she was a finalist in the 2024 NYC Midnight 100-word Microfiction Challenge. She is also the co-founder and co-owner of the flash fiction writing competition Jerboa Lit, which recently published its first-ever anthology of contest winners, and she’s going to see their mascot Jerbie to victory in their fantasy football league.

Nancy L. Davis publishes poetry and short fiction. Her work has appeared in Cutthroat, The Dewdrop, The Orchards Poetry Journal, SuperPresent, The Banyan Review, and The Connecticut Review, among others. She has received many awards for her writing including a Pushcart Prize Nomination in Poetry, First Place in the Sandy Crimmins National Poetry Prize, Second Place in the Chicago Poets & Patrons 67th Annual Poetry Contest, Honorable Mention in the Joy Harjo Poetry Prize, and the Atlanta Review’s International Merit Award. In 2019, Ghosts, her poetry chapbook, was published by Finishing Line Press. Voices in the Sky, a poetry collection, was published in July of this year and is the winner of the 2026 Prairie State Poetry Prize, available through Highland Park Poetry Press and Amazon. A native of Upstate New York, Davis is a retired Associate Professor of English with an MFA from the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. She divides her time between Park Ridge, IL, and Long Beach, IN, on Lake Michigan.

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Everyone is welcome! Suggested donation is $5. All proceeds pay our authors, so let’s give them a good night! So please like and share and all that jazz. 

In addition to fine literary entertainment, you may purchase signed copies of our authors’ books. Snacks and a cash bar will also be available. 

And now there’s an Open Mic after each event! (Sans the Teen Event.) We limit participants, so arrive early to sign up! We also ask that readers keep their performances to under five minutes. And of course, please be respectful and stay for the whole show. Resist the urge to flee after you’ve read.

Water Street Studios has graciously donated their gallery to us, all that they ask is that we respect the art and their space. In return, as they are a nonprofit, we ask you to consider becoming members to support their unique programming. (Which includes some writing classes!)

The show is brought to you by Cathy Borders, Kevin Moriarity, Ray Ziemer, Michelle Donfrio, and Eric Bodwell, who is our event’s emcee. And the lovely Susan Ward Trestrail Photography documents our events.

Experience Water Street Writers four precious Sundays a year in the fully accessible main art gallery at Water Street Studios. For more information, contact Cathy Borders at waterstreetwriters@rolreadlocal.com.

Submissions are always open. We pick from the slush pile each and every event. Multiple submissions are okay. Our next event will be October 25th, then we’ll meet again in February and April.

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Guidelines

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Inspired by Waterline Writers, Water Street Writers is dedicated to excellence and quality. Since its inception in 2012, Waterline Writers had earned its reputation as the premier reading series of the Fox Valley, something we hope to maintain in the years to come.

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