I’m not sure why I chose to pick up One Hundred Years of Solitude this year. I’ve a running list of classic literature that I incorporate into my regular reading. Primarily to compensate for my lack of education, but also because I enjoy understanding cultural references in art that have…
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The Q Review | Death Valley | Melissa Broder
This is my first encounter with Melissa Broder. I really want to read The Pisces, but it wasn’t available yet, so I put it on hold and opted for this one instead. I love surrealism, magical realism, unlikable characters, and the desert, so I figured I’d love this. It was…
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The Q Review | Blazing Eye Sees All | Leah Sottile
I fucking love cults. Not joining them, of course. I was raised in one, so I expend an enormous amount of personal energy avoiding anything cult-like in my daily life and spiritual practice. However, it is undoubtedly due to my personal history that I have a morbid fascination with them….
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The Q Review | Twilight | Stephanie Meyer
It is the year 2025 AD, and I, a fifty-one-year-old woman, have read Twilight by Stephanie Meyer for the very first time. It should also be noted that I have never seen any of the films based on this series. Any prior knowledge I had of this book and its…
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TQL Podcast | S3E19 | Rita Toikka
Support The Qreative Life podcast through my Patreon, or via Paypal or Venmo (@AmandaQ555). S3E19 | Rita Toikka | LISTEN NOW In this episode of The Qreative Life podcast, Q reconnects with Rita Toikka, an artist who has followed an unconventional path – first as a frontwoman of an L.A.-based rock band, then…
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The Q Review | Algorithms of Betrayal | Anat Deracine
I found Algorithms of Betrayal by Anat Decine on NetGalley. This book took a while to grow on me, but once I got into it, I was hooked. I’m chalking my initial reticence up to my baggage working in and around technology for 20+ years. Initially, it felt like this…
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The Q Review | Yours, Eventually | Nura Maznavi
Nura Maznavi’s Yours, Eventually is a combination of a Pakistani television drama and a Jane Austen novel. Neither of these things on their own is particularly compelling to me, but put them together and set the action in the Bay Area, and I’m in. Like, really in. I am so glad I got the…
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The Q Review | The Grand Scheme of Things | Warona Jay
A couple of months ago, I read Yellowface by R.H. Kuang. While I enjoyed it for all the juicy drama (and gave it four stars), part of my critique was that the characters felt two-dimensional, making the book seem less about people and more about the issues on which the…
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Wanna save the world? Touch grass.
It’s a beautiful afternoon in Austin, Texas. I just returned from a six-mile walk through our neighborhood. The sky is a cloudless, fathomless blue that hurts your eyes when you look at it for too long. Riots of wildflowers have crowded the empty lots and undeveloped fields. I paused momentarily…
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The Q Review | Outlive | Peter Attia, MD
Last November, as I lay in my bed recovering from foot surgery, my husband came home from a doctor’s appointment and told me that he needed surgery, too. A quadruple bypass. He’s 52. Needless to say, this experience has lit a fire under our asses to re-examine our diet and…