From the bestselling author of Forever Fifty comes a new collection of poems that tickle, console, and offer the pleasure of instant recognition -- the perfect book for any woman anywhere in the vicinity of sixty.

Judith Viorst's "decade" books of verse -- including It's Hard to Be Hip Over Thirty, How Did I Get to Be Forty, and Forever Fifty -- have delighted millions of readers worldwide who relish her wit, warmth, and wisdom. Now here she is with Suddenly Sixty, a funny and touching book that speaks directly to the sixty-ish woman, inviting her to laugh about, sigh over, and come to hopeful terms with the complex issues of this decade of life.

Among the poems in this charmingly illustrated collection are those exploring the joys -- and strains -- of children and grandchildren, and the intimacy of old friends who've "known each other so long/We knew each other back when we were virgins". There are poems that tip their hat to mortality, wrestle with a husband's retirement -- "He's coming with me when I shop at the supermarket/So I won't have to shop alone. I like alone". -- and acknowledge the fact that at this stage of life we'd "give up a night of wild rapture with Denzel Washington for a nice report on my next bone density test". Offering plenty of laughs, a few tears, and cover-to-cover truths, these are poems for everyone who would "rather say never say die than enough is enough". Every woman who has reached this decade will -- rueful and smiling -- find herself in the pages of this book.

Contents

Suddenly Sixty

It's Harder to Be Frisky Over Sixty

The Blissful Couple

The New Alphabet

Old Friends

Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep

A Modest Proposal

A Whole Other Stage

A Brief History of Marriage

In the Beginning

After a While

To Be Continued

More on Marriage

So My Husband and I Decided to Take a Car Trip Through New England

A Very Very Brief History of Marriage

In Response to a Request for an Apology

Anniversary Dinner

About His Retirement

A Wedding Sonnet for the Next Generation

The Children and Grandchildren

Just a Few Words of Advice, Just a Few Helpful Hints

Did I Do Something Wrong?

Our Wonderful Annual Full-Fledged Family Vacation

When I Watch

Being a Grandparent Is the Best Revenge

The Sweetest of Nights and the Finest of Days

Other Shocks

When Asked If I Thought That I'd Finally Got It Together

Late Love

To a Husband Who, After Forty-two Years, Dumped My Wonderful Friend for a Much Younger Woman

Cemeteries and Other Plots

A Thoroughly Modern Sixty

Mortal Question

Just Lucky I Guess

If Only

Judith Viorst is the author of the beloved Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, which has sold some four million copies; the Lulu books, including Lulu and the Brontosaurus; the New York Times bestseller Necessary Losses; four musicals; and poetry for children and adults. Her most recent books of poetry include What Are You Glad About? What Are You Mad About? and Nearing Ninety. She lives in Washington, DC.