happy Easter to those who observe! and to those who don’t, happy last day of March (more on this later). it’s been a very special weekend over here including two book clubs, a visit from my sister, and so many restaurants I’ve nearly lost track…except that I think about food constantly, so I’m surely going to round up the highlights for you.
after four nights up in the Hudson Valley with our work crew, I got back to the city on thursday to head straight to an event at Meta. thank you so much to Emma Benshoff (see her sunday series Q&A where we talk about “how to start a book club” here) for including me in this installment of the Creator Book Club by Threads where author Iman Hariri-Kia (see her sunday series Q&A here and be sure to keep an eye out for her forthcoming sophomore novel, The Most Famous Girl in The World) led a conversation with author Amanda Montell (today’s guest!!). their conversation was a super insightful dive into some of the topics that Amanda explores in her latest book, The Age of Magical Overthinking, which is centered on the innate irrationalities that inform our decision-making…aka, magical overthinking.
on Friday, I hosted West Village Book Club as we dove into Carola Lovering’s latest, Bye, Baby. if you’re looking for a book club pick that will incite deep conversation, the themes of toxic friendship, sexual abuse, and motherhood are sure to spark an interesting chat amongst your group. as far as food, I themed our menu around spring! this involved Easter baskets for the girlies, a crudité board that looked like the remnants of a bunny pillaging the vegetable garden, lamb and chicken shawarma, and tomato-cucumber-feta salad, followed by a Wegmans carrot cake (this one rivals Magnolia for me) with “BYE, BABY, WVBC’s Version” written on top! as a fun twist, I put all the discussion questions inside easter eggs, and we went around to keep our conversation on track.
to recap the best things I ate during me and my sister’s dining adventures this weekend, here are some highlights: the french toast at Little Owl, the fries at Claudette, the cherry almond croissant at Rigor Hill Market, the shaved brussels sprouts salad at Left Bank (forever a go-to), the grilled artichokes at Bobo, and the spicy tuna arancini at San Sabino. on the note of San Sabino, unless you’re one of the lucky ones, I’m guessing you too will have trouble snagging a Resy, so let me tell you how walk-ins work. they start taking names at 5p; we got there yesterday at about twenty past four to see over forty people already queuing. we ended up being slotted for bar spots between 8-8:45p and when we got back to be seated, we were thrilled to find we had an actual table! our experience definitely lived up to the hype, and thanks to my friend Jenna who’d already been, we had a solid ordering plan that included the garlic bread martinis, tricolored salad, stuffed mussels, lobster pasta, stuffed farfalle, and gelato viennese for dessert.
HARD pivot from menu detailing, but it being the 31st has me feeling some kind of way. while I hate to be so unoriginal as to think about life in the realm of the “quarters” that the corporate world has designed our goals around, alas, I’m a product of my environment. today marks the last day of the first quarter of the year (arguably, the toughest??) and tomorrow, our slate gets wiped clean with a fresh week month, a fresh month, a fresh quarter…and all of that kickstarted by April Fools nonetheless! I’ll be spending some time as today comes to a close by reading (I just started Maybe Next Time by Cesca Major) and journaling. I’m going using my friend
’s prompts outlined in this reel, but I’m going to adjust them from “month” to “quarter.” if you want to join me, here are the prompts I’m working off! xKDwhat brought you joy this quarter?
what are you proud of from the quarter?
what do you wish you did *more of* this quarter?
what’s one thing you want to add to your life next quarter?
meet Amanda Montell
after reading Amanda’s last book, Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism, I fell in love with her ability to break down seemingly intimidating academic concepts into stories that resonate. Amanda Montell is a writer, linguist, and podcast host living in Los Angeles whose books (Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism, Wordslut: A Feminist Guide to Taking Back the English Language, and The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality) have earned praise from The Washington Post, The Atlantic, Kirkus Reviews, and more. Amanda’s essays and reporting have appeared in The New York Times, Harper’s Bazaar, Marie Claire, and elsewhere. in our Q&A below, we chat about her latest which hits bookshelves on Tuesday, April 9th.
Kayla Douglas: Hi, Amanda! For those unfamiliar with your work, what are some core questions you aim to answer through your research?
Amanda Montell: Oh gosh so many questions, from broad to microscopic! With this book, questions I hoped to answer include, why, in the Information Age, does life only seem to be making less sense? Why are we losing ourselves in delusions like extreme celebrity worship, Instagram manifestation gurus, and nostalgic revisions of the distant past? Why aren't we getting along? What is responsible for this digital-age existential dread so many of us feel? In general, I’m just so interested in the relationships between culture, language, technology, power, and meaning.
KD: After having written extensively about the language of feminism and the language of fanaticism, what inspired THE AGE OF MAGICAL OVERTHINKING?
AM: As I was writing my last book Cultish, I kept coming across all this fascinating psychology and behavioral economics research about cognitive biases, aka these mental magical tricks we naturally play on ourselves which historically helped us make efficient decisions. Confirmation bias and sunk cost fallacy are two of the most famous, but hundreds of others have been described. I was fascinated by how these biases explained not only the cult behavior I was examining but also so many of the confounding beliefs and behaviors I was noticing in the zeitgeist at large and my own life, from extreme celebrity worship to growing obsessions with Instagram manifestation “gurus” to my own choice in my early 20s to stick out a romantic relationship that I knew caused me great suffering. I knew right away I wanted my next project to contextualize cognitive biases in the modern age in a way that was equally informed by social science, cultural criticism, and relatable personal stories.
KD: You talk about digital-age delusion and other internet-related topics in your research. How much does the Information Age impact the work you're doing?
AM: It’s the whole basis for it! We are all such a product of our time. I had this theory that our Stone Age brains were somehow clashing with the onslaught of information, identities, and technological complexity we’re suddenly assigned to confront every day. It turned out that cognitive biases were a huge part of the answer to why living in the Information Age doesn’t seem to be helping us make better sense of the world or feel better.
KD: Your work uses sociolinguistics as a lens to investigate how people form connections and wield power. THE AGE OF MAGICAL OVERTHINKING cuts to the marrow of why we are the way we are at this moment in time. Who is this book for, and what do you hope readers will take away from it?
AM: This book is for magical overthinkers. By that I mean anyone who feels a sort of nebulous ennui or confusion about why it simply feels so hard to exist as a human in the world right now, but still dreams of how thing could be better. The book is really meant to help us all feel validated, which develops more compassion toward others’ irrationalities and skepticism of our own.
KD: How do you define "magical overthinking"?
AM: Magical thinking all on its own is an age-old psychological quirk, describing humans’ inherent, widespread belief that our internal thoughts can affect external events. But magical overthinking feels distinct to the modern era—a product of our innate superstitions colliding with data overload, mass loneliness, and a capitalistic pressure to “know” everything under the sun. I like the phrase because even though it represents something painful, there’s also an upside! For a long time, cognitive biases helped us make sense of the world enough to survive it. Being perfectly rational simply isn’t human, and despite the contemporary drawbacks, there is a “magic” in magical overthinking. Being aware of the innate irrationalities that inform our decision-making can help us make the best of them while avoiding the worst.
KD: Each of your books requires a great deal of research. How do you approach this phase of the writing process? Was anything about researching THE AGE OF MAGICAL OVERTHINKING different from your other books?
AM: The research process for TAOMO was the most fun of all because I basically had free rein to read and incorporate whatever types of literature I wanted since the book is so genre-fluid. I started out by gaining a foundational understanding of each cognitive bias by reading a volume of academic papers, both the earliest and latest writings on each one; then, I read more mainstream psychology and cultural criticism books, like Mistakes Were Made But Not By Me and by Carol Tavris and Eliot Aronson. Then as each chapter took shape, I read, re-read, and folded in a huge range of references, from Sylvia Plath poems to bell hooks speeches to Taylor Swift lyrics.
KD: Tell us about the most recent work of fiction that left you with a book hangover.
AM: Omg, Miranda July’s new novel, All Fours! It’s perfectly weird, as July always is, and deals with themes of aging, desire, and hotel decor.
KD: What book is on your TBR pile that you're most excited to pick up?
AM: My pal Coco Mellors’s new book, Blue Sisters. That book has a cult following already and it doesn’t come out til the fall! I know how much work she put into drafting and perfecting and I can’t wait to experience the fruits of that labor. I’m also interested in reading a bit more literary sci-fi since I have plans to write a novel adjacent to that genre next :)
KD: The Sunday Series was conceptualized as a love letter to my favorite day of the week. If we were with you in your neighborhood on Sunday, where would you take us to spend the afternoon?
AM: A pick-me-up coffee at my house because my partner Casey happens to make the best iced oat cortados in LA! Then we might schlep over to the Huntington Gardens 20 minutes east in Pasadena, because that expanse of roses and koi ponds is the only place in town that makes me feel truly calm. Bring a book, read under a tree for a while. After that, we’d prob head back to my neck of the woods for a cheese plate and glass of wine at La Pharmacie du Vin, an al fresco wine shop and bar that feels like a back alley in the south of France.
KD: Where can readers preorder THE AGE OF MAGICAL OVERTHINKING and follow along with your work?
AM: You can preorder wherever books are sold! I highly recommend doing so from your local indie bookstore or bookshop.org, but you can also preorder from the big online retailer with fast shipping* or skylightbooks.com for a limited editing signed copy! Otherwise, you can catch my podcast “Sounds Like A Cult” every Tuesday wherever you listen to pods, my Substack (
) three times a week, and Instagram more often than I’d like to admit. And I’m also throwing a pretty over-the-top live show for my book tour! Tickets here!