In Our Prime: Empowering Essays by Women on Love, Family, Career, Aging, and Just Coping

This is a "must have" book for women of all ages. The essays cover a variety of topics and are well written with insights that women can relate to and benefit from. This book would make an excellent selection for Book Clubs. Do yourself a favor and order several copies -- one for yourself and more for dear friends.

I just finished reading "In Our Prime" yesterday and enjoyed hearing distinct voices from such a diverse group of women who yet shared areas of concern and awareness. I was fascinated by how we are the same and how we are different. Historically our generation is unique in where we began and where we ended, what we anticipated and what we got. The next generation of educated women starts from a completely different place. They often seem foreign to me and we must seem outlandish to them. In fifty years books like this will be the voices telling of our times.

Every one of the forty essays in this book offers up some form of wisdom or insight into our own aging process, how we live and love and often learn how to change into our best selves as we age. In a way it symbolizes the triumph of intelligence and courage over the many discouragements of aging in a culture that often seems only to value youth. What these writers share is an ageless spirit and confidence that comes from maturing at a time when women have had greater opportunities than their mothers.

Although I am not yet over 50, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. In fact, I stayed up nearly all night reading the compelling essays. The topics were exciting. The emotion was authentic, and at times, raw. Inspired by their honesty, I found a part of myself, my life, reflected. Some made me cry, and some made me laugh out loud. Some are written under pseudonyms gave me pause to consider the intense depth of their stories. This would be a great book for a women's studies class or committed book group. The material is exceptional.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading these essays by women who have lived long enough to have learned that life is complex; wonderful, heartbreaking, joyful, full of sadness and triumph. This realization has offered them the wisdom to accept what life has given them and to just keep going, keep growing and keep learning. These are short essays about many aspects of a woman's life. Sure, they are all over 50, but with any luck, you young women out there will reach that venerable age one day and you might get a head start on wisdom by reading this book!