Formal Bio (followed by a Long Informal and a Short Informal Bio)

Matthew Quick’s debut novel THE SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK (Sarah Crichton Books / Farrar, Straus & Giroux) was a 2009 PEN/Hemingway Award Honorable Mention and lauded by People, The Wall Street Journal, National Public Radio, Publishers Weekly, and others. For NPR, Nancy Pearl picked TSLP as one of ‘Summer’s Best Books’ (2009). The movie rights have been optioned by The Weinstein Company, and David O. Russell has written the screenplay adaptation. TSLP has been translated into Italian, Spanish, Chinese, and Russian (forthcoming); it was also published by Picador in the UK and selected by Amanda Ross for The TV Book Club. Matthew’s debut young adult novel SORTA LIKE A ROCK STAR (Little, Brown & Co.) received a starred review from School Library Journal. Matthew earned his BA through La Salle University and his MFA through Goddard College. He lives in the Philadelphia area with his wife, novelist Alicia Bessette.

To read testimonials, please click ‘What People are Saying…‘ on the right.

Long Informal:

When Matthew Quick (a.k.a. Q) was seventeen years old, his English teacher (and first official fan) submitted two of his poems to a contest.  A few weeks later he was put on a bus with other hopeful teen writers, taken to a local university, and given a live critique.  A well-meaning professor told Q that his poetry wasn’t very good.  So Q decided to write stories.

A year later, well-meaning people convinced Q that he probably would never make a living as a storyteller, so he majored in Secondary Education / English.  But try as he might, Q couldn’t quit writing stories, even after he became a high school teacher with plenty of responsibilities.

Q told his students that they should take risks and do amazing things, because there is potential in all of us.  He became known for his impassioned speeches about literature—how it pushes us to live an examined life, and how Thoreau promised success unexpected in quiet hours for those who dare to live the life they imagine, for those who advance confidently in the direction of their dreams.

Q began to feel like a gigantic hypocrite.

Even at the age of thirty, he still wanted to tell stories.  Many of his friends and colleagues said he was too old, but his wife—frustrated with his melancholy—told him to follow his bliss or file for divorce, because she wanted the old Q back, the one who was ready to devour life, the wide-eyed kid who was going to publish his stories.

Q quit his tenured teaching position, sold his house, floated down the Peruvian Amazon and formed The Bardbarians (a two-man literary circle), backpacked around Southern Africa, hiked to the bottom of a snowy Grand Canyon, soul-searched, and began writing full-time in his in-laws’ unfinished basement.  (Yes, he humbly lived with his generous in-laws for three years.  God bless Barb and Peague!)

Most well-meaning people thought Q had gone insane.  Many shook their heads.  Some said, “Hey, Q, have you gone absolutely crazy?”

Q kept working, writing, dreaming, hoping, and believing.

Finally, he emerged from the basement with a finished manuscript called THE SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK.  He found an agent, who sold the novel in several countries—before selling the movie rights to The Weinstein Company.

Well-meaning people stopped calling Q crazy.  (Well, some of them.)  People started to believe what he always believed in his heart—that he is a writer.

Q now lives in the Philadelphia area with his wife, novelist Alicia Bessette.

Short Informal:

For several years, Matthew Quick (a.k.a. Q) told his students that they should take risks and do amazing things, because there is potential in all of us.  He became known for his impassioned speeches about literature—how it pushes us to live an examined life, and how Thoreau promised success unexpected in quiet hours for those who dare to live the life they imagine, for those who advance confidently in the direction of their dreams.

Because he secretly wanted to be a novelist, but had settled for the more financially stable life of a teacher, Q began to feel like a gigantic hypocrite.

He quit his tenured teaching position, sold his house, floated down the Peruvian Amazon and formed The Bardbarians (a two-man literary circle), backpacked around Southern Africa, hiked to the bottom of a snowy Grand Canyon, soul-searched, and finally began writing full-time in his in-laws’ unfinished basement.

Three years later, he emerged from the basement with a finished manuscript called THE SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK.  He found an agent, who sold the novel in several countries—before selling the movie rights to The Weinstein Company.

Q now lives in the Philadelphia area with his wife, novelist Alicia Bessette.