Bestselling novelist Celeste Ng is blessed with prodigious gifts. She writes gorgeous, lush sentences that make us look at ourselves and our world differently. Her first two novels have sold more than 2 million copies and her second novel, “Little Fires Everywhere,” became a popular TV series starring Reese Witherspoon. She comes to Santa Cruz on Oct. 18 for a Bookshop Santa Cruz event at UCSC’s Cowell Ranch Hay Barn to talk about her new novel, “Our Missing Hearts.” Witherspoon just tapped the book as her October pick. Community Voices editor Jody K. Biehl talks to Ng about the book, writing, the role of the humanities and artists, the rise of Donald Trump, motherhood and more.
Community Voices
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Letter to the editor: Vote yes on N; too many people are forced to leave Santa Cruz over housing
Have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor, within our policies, from readers. Guidelines here. To the editor: As a homeowner and landlord in Santa Cruz for the past 12 years, I have seen rental prices skyrocket such that many of my friends who must rent simply can no longer afford. This has […]
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Letter to the editor: Reed Geisreiter and Toby Goddard deserve your vote for reelection to Port Commission
Have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor, within our policies, from readers. Guidelines here. To the editor: I have closely observed the Santa Cruz Port Commission over the past several years and strongly endorse Reed Geisreiter and Toby Goddard for re-election. They each have the experience needed and proven track records of […]
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Stop watering your cactus! Why succulents matter and how to stop killing them
Martin Quigley, director of UC Santa Cruz’s Arboretum & Botanic Garden, is back with more tips on climate-friendly planting. This time, he tackles succulents, everyone’s favorite office and garden plant, and outlines why they are excellent choices for our Mediterranean climate. And he takes us backstage at the Arb to show us how he “makes” plant babies. You can do it, too.
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Letter to the editor: We are women who own businesses downtown and we support Shebreh for supervisor
Have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor, within our policies, from readers. Guidelines here. To the editor: One of our favorite things about owning businesses in downtown Santa Cruz is that the majority of local stores are owned by women and mothers. In fact, all three of us have raised our families […]
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A year after my father’s death, I’m still getting to know him; turns out his time with Pranksters wasn’t so merry
Dean Quarnstrom died in 2021 and his son Evan has spent the year since traveling the world, mourning and reading his dad’s journals, which chronicle his days hovering on the fringes of Ken Kesey’s Merry Pranksters in 1960s Santa Cruz. Dean describes the Pranksters as “pretentious,” “untrustworthy” and a “bunch of a–holes.” As he reads his father’s writing, Evan relives the counterculture generation — including his dad’s stories about Janis Joplin, the Grateful Dead and Hells Angels — and gets to know a side of his father he never knew.
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Letter to the editor: We need to stop poisoning our farmworker families in Watsonville
Have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor, within our policies, from readers. Guidelines here. To the editor: Thank you for your Oct. 3 article on pesticides. I was present at the CORA event with T. S. MacQuiddy Elementary School and Driscoll’s. It made me so sad to see the children with leukemia, […]
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Letter to the editor: I spend nearly half my income on rent and will never afford a home; vote yes on N
Have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor, within our policies, from readers. Guidelines here. To the editor: In the wealthiest country, in one of the most expensive places to live, why can’t we guarantee that everyone has a place to live? With all this abundance, what is preventing it from being shared? […]
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From warring yard signs to national vitriol, election season has pre-Civil War feel
Election season is in the air. For Claudia Sternbach, the constant vitriol and opposition she sees online, in the news and even in warring Santa Cruz County yard signs is disturbing. Worried about our current divisions, she headed to her local bookstore and bought two new novels on the Civil War — “Booth” by well-known Santa Cruz author Karen Joy Fowler and “Horse” by Pulitzer Prize winner Geraldine Brooks. Both, she writes, speak to us today as we edge toward Nov. 8.
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Letter to the editor: Santa Cruz really goofed on losing Garfield church
Have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor, within our policies, from readers. Guidelines here. To the editor: It is unthinkable that the Garfield church could ever be demolished as is planned and approved. What a loss for the neighborhood. We know the building itself has no historical significance, but that site certainly […]