I haven’t read that series yet, though it has been recommended by many people. I’m probably gonna have to read it to give a definitive answer on whether it meets my criteria. Thank you for adding to my list
You are very welcome :) I think you will love them, they are fast-paced and great reads. As I always say about super successful books - 'they sold millions of copies for a reason'. I can only speak for the first 3, written by the original author Stieg Larsson who tragically died before his books became a worldwide phenomenon. Enjoy!
As I was reading your request for recommendations, drive your plow over the bones of the dead came to mind, and then I saw you already have it on hold. It’s my favorite book of the past decades!
I’m also thinking, The Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead.
I really enjoyed this writing, which I found by way of Allison Deraney. 🙏💚
Oh, and I would add that I feel the same way as you do about overly glamorous or beautiful women; they just look like work! 😊
Thank you for reading and adding to my TBR list. Also, ‘favorite book of the past decades’ is a strong endorsement. I’m now even more excited to read DYPOTBOTD. And I can attest, as a beautiful woman myself 😉that we are a lot of work. The upkeep is exhausting. No time for naps or dinner. And thank you @Allison Deraney !
I can't tell you how many times I laughed at this. And how much I relate to perimenopause being a chemical castration. I just don't have desire and honestly I'm over it anyway. The misophonia is really real.
PS you are totally cool enough for your own comment section. Any comment section.
Thank you for being chemically castrated with me and telling me I’m cool. I’ve had active crushes going since I was five, so this new era is pretty liberating.
Julie! It’s been a minute since I’ve read one of your pieces and I’m sitting asking myself how did that happen! God I love your writing- so honest and funny and relatable. Also why now feel like I’m going to have to check on love island 😂
It used be a point of pride for me that that I didn’t watch reality television until about ten years ago when I watched my first episode of Vanderpump Rules. Love Island airs a new episode almost every night in the summer. It’s such a comfort to know that it will be waiting for me when I get home from work. You don’t need to check on it. It’s not that good. It’s just there.
Julie, this essay turns perimenopause, literary inheritance, Love Island, firefighters, Miranda July, and maternal projection into one wonderfully strange meditation on desire after desire starts changing shape. The line about handsome men looking like work captures so much of the second-half shift: attraction becomes less fantasy and more cost-benefit analysis with a pulse. I appreciate how the piece keeps its humor while asking a real question about women’s stories beyond marriage, mating, rejection, and tragic endings. The book request at the end feels like the truest doorway: give her a plot wide enough to live in.
OK, a few book recs (I have read each of them) with a female protagonist who does not end up cozied up or dead:
1) Iona Iverson's Rules for Commuting-adorable, funny, heartwarming, smart story about a 50ish year old woman who makes friends with a bunch of other weirdos-aka humans-while commuting on the train in London
2) Where'd You Go Bernadette? -it's been a few years on this one, but my memory is of a middle aged Mom who is overwhelmed, unappreciated and misunderstood and runs away to solve a mystery in Antarctica
3) The Frozen River-historical fiction-not my usual genre but it was for a book club and it was sooo good-about women and the patriarchy (my words), but centered on a midwife (based on a real midwife) who lived in Maine in 1789
4) The Wedding People-I almost did not read and almost DNF this before hardly getting started because this story starts off pretty rough with suicidal ideation, but without giving spoilers, I am glad I did finish it...(and I realize I might have given away a spoiler right there...sigh)
5)Shark Heart-one of the most odd and unique "love stories" I have ever read, where the protagonist does not end up cozied up or dead
I could go on, but I will stop at 5.
Just wanted to give you some reading material to keep your mind (and eyes) off those firefighters, ya know, should ya need it.
Yes, Rosemary my librarian coming through with the book recs. I’ve heard of The Wedding People and Where’d you Go, Bernadette but haven’t read any of these. They’re going on the list.
Rosemary, I had no idea about your bypass and am so glad you’re still here. My waning libido actually happened after making the conscious choice to be celibate. I wonder how much of it is my body just accepting that we don’t do that anymore—a feedback loop perhaps. A part of me thinks that the right person might wake it up, but another part of me is skeptical and wonders if that’s just old romantic narratives telling ghost stories in my head. Who knows?
hmm. good questions to be asking. For me, I made a conscious decision to take a long break from dating, but honestly, taking an entire year felt impossible at the time (like giving up alcohol at first), but then I read Melissa Febos' The Dry Season -have you read it? I think you would like it. It is like going on a walk through a year of celibacy with your smartest, most intellectual, feminist friend. It was after reading her memoir, that I decided I would make a year my goal. I wish my body would get the message that me and dating: we are on a break...coming up on 18 months of a break...and thanks, I am glad I am still here too, though for about three or so months, I daily thought about not...it was a dark time...apparently, clinical depression post open heart surgery is a common thing...but the docs do not prepare you for this...and so most of us are at home, angry, depressed, hating every one and thinking this "new life" is not worth living....but I am back in the light now, whew...and wanting to share some of my war stories and lessons.
“chemical castration” 🤣
Julie - you ARE cool enough. And seriously the wittiest writer around. Gawd, this one made me belly laugh.
I have zero recommendations as to your next book to aid in your research 🙃 but I also am spectacularly unhorny lately.
I’m glad I could make you belly laugh, Allison. Thank you for making me feel cool.
This essay!!!
Is The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo series acceptable??? I think it fits your criteria.And the three books are a wonderful read.
Lisbeth is one of the best characters, female or male, of the last 20 years 😊
I haven’t read that series yet, though it has been recommended by many people. I’m probably gonna have to read it to give a definitive answer on whether it meets my criteria. Thank you for adding to my list
You are very welcome :) I think you will love them, they are fast-paced and great reads. As I always say about super successful books - 'they sold millions of copies for a reason'. I can only speak for the first 3, written by the original author Stieg Larsson who tragically died before his books became a worldwide phenomenon. Enjoy!
As I was reading your request for recommendations, drive your plow over the bones of the dead came to mind, and then I saw you already have it on hold. It’s my favorite book of the past decades!
I’m also thinking, The Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead.
I really enjoyed this writing, which I found by way of Allison Deraney. 🙏💚
Oh, and I would add that I feel the same way as you do about overly glamorous or beautiful women; they just look like work! 😊
Thank you for reading and adding to my TBR list. Also, ‘favorite book of the past decades’ is a strong endorsement. I’m now even more excited to read DYPOTBOTD. And I can attest, as a beautiful woman myself 😉that we are a lot of work. The upkeep is exhausting. No time for naps or dinner. And thank you @Allison Deraney !
I love that you and @Don Boivin connected! 🤗🤗
Haha, I’ll take Sally Fields any day of the week! (But I’m married so she’ll just have to be a friend. 😊)
I can't tell you how many times I laughed at this. And how much I relate to perimenopause being a chemical castration. I just don't have desire and honestly I'm over it anyway. The misophonia is really real.
PS you are totally cool enough for your own comment section. Any comment section.
Thank you for being chemically castrated with me and telling me I’m cool. I’ve had active crushes going since I was five, so this new era is pretty liberating.
Julie! It’s been a minute since I’ve read one of your pieces and I’m sitting asking myself how did that happen! God I love your writing- so honest and funny and relatable. Also why now feel like I’m going to have to check on love island 😂
It used be a point of pride for me that that I didn’t watch reality television until about ten years ago when I watched my first episode of Vanderpump Rules. Love Island airs a new episode almost every night in the summer. It’s such a comfort to know that it will be waiting for me when I get home from work. You don’t need to check on it. It’s not that good. It’s just there.
Julie, this essay turns perimenopause, literary inheritance, Love Island, firefighters, Miranda July, and maternal projection into one wonderfully strange meditation on desire after desire starts changing shape. The line about handsome men looking like work captures so much of the second-half shift: attraction becomes less fantasy and more cost-benefit analysis with a pulse. I appreciate how the piece keeps its humor while asking a real question about women’s stories beyond marriage, mating, rejection, and tragic endings. The book request at the end feels like the truest doorway: give her a plot wide enough to live in.
OK, a few book recs (I have read each of them) with a female protagonist who does not end up cozied up or dead:
1) Iona Iverson's Rules for Commuting-adorable, funny, heartwarming, smart story about a 50ish year old woman who makes friends with a bunch of other weirdos-aka humans-while commuting on the train in London
2) Where'd You Go Bernadette? -it's been a few years on this one, but my memory is of a middle aged Mom who is overwhelmed, unappreciated and misunderstood and runs away to solve a mystery in Antarctica
3) The Frozen River-historical fiction-not my usual genre but it was for a book club and it was sooo good-about women and the patriarchy (my words), but centered on a midwife (based on a real midwife) who lived in Maine in 1789
4) The Wedding People-I almost did not read and almost DNF this before hardly getting started because this story starts off pretty rough with suicidal ideation, but without giving spoilers, I am glad I did finish it...(and I realize I might have given away a spoiler right there...sigh)
5)Shark Heart-one of the most odd and unique "love stories" I have ever read, where the protagonist does not end up cozied up or dead
I could go on, but I will stop at 5.
Just wanted to give you some reading material to keep your mind (and eyes) off those firefighters, ya know, should ya need it.
Yes, Rosemary my librarian coming through with the book recs. I’ve heard of The Wedding People and Where’d you Go, Bernadette but haven’t read any of these. They’re going on the list.
The title of this essay. 👏
I’m 61.
Full on menopausal.
Was gunning for 1 year of celibacy from sex & dating when
Had a lil brush with death 6 months ago via a heart attack. Had quadruple bypass surgery.
Still here.
Still alive.
Still horny.
Fuck me.
Well. Don’t fuck me.
I’m thinking of going on Lexapro just so my sex drive will go away.
I have desire.
I have lust.
What I don’t have is a desire to be in a relationship with a man < at the moment, anyway. I reserve the right to change my mind.>
My working title for that essay is, "Scared Celibate." Joking. Mostly. Sort of. Sadly, hardly at all.
Book recs in separate comment to follow. <as a former para librarian you know I gotta give you book recs, plus, I want to. >
Rosemary, I had no idea about your bypass and am so glad you’re still here. My waning libido actually happened after making the conscious choice to be celibate. I wonder how much of it is my body just accepting that we don’t do that anymore—a feedback loop perhaps. A part of me thinks that the right person might wake it up, but another part of me is skeptical and wonders if that’s just old romantic narratives telling ghost stories in my head. Who knows?
hmm. good questions to be asking. For me, I made a conscious decision to take a long break from dating, but honestly, taking an entire year felt impossible at the time (like giving up alcohol at first), but then I read Melissa Febos' The Dry Season -have you read it? I think you would like it. It is like going on a walk through a year of celibacy with your smartest, most intellectual, feminist friend. It was after reading her memoir, that I decided I would make a year my goal. I wish my body would get the message that me and dating: we are on a break...coming up on 18 months of a break...and thanks, I am glad I am still here too, though for about three or so months, I daily thought about not...it was a dark time...apparently, clinical depression post open heart surgery is a common thing...but the docs do not prepare you for this...and so most of us are at home, angry, depressed, hating every one and thinking this "new life" is not worth living....but I am back in the light now, whew...and wanting to share some of my war stories and lessons.
What a great read. I'm with you - firefighters are about the only thing that really light my fire these days too, ironic.