Who hasn’t experienced life’s painful jabs—especially those of us who have rounded the corner into middle age? Emotional family events, stress from lousy jobs, the bittersweet feelings when the kids leave home, body image issues, and turning the big 5-0 . . . it’s all covered here in Cindy Eastman’s collection of personal and insightful essays. In Flip-Flops After Fifty, Eastman tackles the sublime and the ridiculous, the sacred and the profane, with her own brand of easy humor. From her 30th high school reunion to her daughter’s wedding to running away to a cabin in Maine to figure out what she wants to do with her life, Eastman braves the ups and downs of midlife, and she comes out of it changed—for the better. At turns wry, hilarious, and poignant, Flip-Flops After Fifty will amuse and enlighten readers, even as it inspires them to think more deeply about the topics that affect us all.

Former international journalist and Los Angeles Times Health and Fitness editor Marilyn Murray Willison approaches aging with an optimistic curiosity and an undisguised enthusiasm. Her syndicated column “Positive Aging” includes practical information—from health, to family legacy, to gratitude, to travel—inspirational stories, current events and personal anecdotes she hopes will inspire other seniors to age with grace and get the most out of each and every day. This is a collection of her columns from 2016 to 2018.

On a hot and humid July day in 2016, I set out from my home in the heart of Toronto on a three-hundred dollar bicycle, alone, forty-one years old, with next-to-no camping or long-distance cycling experience. My destination: more than two thousand kilometers away, the Cabot Trail. I had no idea what I was doing or why I was doing it. All I knew was I was scared as hell. Single, no children, and perhaps feeling a little lost, I was unsure of so many things about my life. However, this bike ride I was entirely sure about. It was the only thing that felt right; so perhaps the journey would give me the reason? But would my girlish gumption be enough to see me through camping alone in the deep, dark woods, riding across thousands of kilometers, and climbing the many mountains of the Cabot Trail? Would going it alone and placing my faith in my fellow humans prove well-founded? Every moment was like a wild and wonderful wager. I knew in my heart that women are strong and that people are good. And this summer, I basically bet my life on it.

Fly-by-the-seat-of-her-pants mom Jennifer Magnuson knew her spoiled suburban brood needed a wake-up call—she just couldn’t find the time to fit one in. But when her husband was offered a position in India, she saw it for what it was: the perfect opportunity for her family to unplug from their over-scheduled and pampered lives in Nashville and gain some much-needed perspective. What she didn’t realize was how much their time in India would transform her as well. A combination of Eat, Pray, Love and Modern Family, with a dash of Chelsea Handler thrown in for good measure, Peanut Butter and Naan is Magnuson’s hilarious look at the chaos of parenting against a backdrop of malaria, extreme poverty, and no conveniences of any kind—and her story of rediscovering herself and revitalizing her connection with those she loves the most. In India, after years of parenting under a cloud of anxiety, Magnuson found a renewed sense of adventure and fearlessness (a discovery that was totally worth the many months of hiding anti-malarial medication in her kids’ morning oatmeal), and started to become the mother she’d always hoped to be. Hers is a story about motherhood that will not only make you laugh and nod with recognition—it will inspire you to fall in love with your own family all over again.

Sikh American women do the lion’s share of organizing and executing the business of the Sikh community, and they straddle multiple lives and worlds—cross-cultural, interreligious, intergenerational, occupational, and domestic—yet their experiences of faith, family, and community are virtually invisible in the North American milieu and have yet to be understood, documented, or shared. Until now. In Her Name is Kaur, Sikh American women explore the concept of love from many angles, offering rich, critical insight into the lives of Sikh women in America. Through a chorus of multi-generational voices—in essays ranging in tone from dramatic to humorous—they share stories of growing into and experiencing self-love, spiritual love, love within family, romantic love, the love they nurture for humanity and the world through their professional work, and more. Eye-opening and multifaceted, this collection of stories encourages its readers to take the feeling of love and turn it into action—practical action that will make the world a better place to be for everyone, regardless of their faith or creed.

Meet Beige. Beige is reliable, practical, sensible, and safe. Beige doesn’t put up a fuss; it follows the rules, blends in, doesn’t want to stand out. Now meet Magenta. Magenta is rich, dynamic, loud, sometimes garish, and not easily overlooked. Society has decidedly beige expectations when it comes to aging, and the intrinsic danger of beige and its many practical aspects is that it precludes creative thinking. Creative thinking is critical in avoiding a beige aging journey. Be Brave. Lose the Beige! Finding Your Sass after Sixty encourages women to trot out their inner magenta and defy those beige expectations. Be Brave. Lose the Beige! started as a blog and morphed into a movement. This movement gently pokes fun at ageist rules and expectations. It says “yes” when the rest of the world keeps saying “no.” In these pages, Liz Kitchens chronicles how creative thinking helped her cope with empty nest syndrome, navigate sex over sixty, transition from being outtasight to literally being out-of-sight . . . and so much more. The stories and creative techniques outlined in this book are guaranteed to introduce color, sass, and a lightness of spirit into your later years. Are you ready to start coloring outside the lines, even if a few pesky rules get trampled in the process?

Candid, relatable stories by established and emerging women writers about being discarded by someone from whom they expected more: a close female friend. There are 161 million women in America today, and our friendships are still as primary and universal as back when Ruth and Naomi, Elizabeth and Susan B., and Thelma and Louise made history. When a romantic relationship breaks up, no problem—there’s an Adele song for that. Health concerns; problems in school; issues at the workplace? We’ve got our chums to prop us up. Until we don’t. When our most sustaining relationships dissolve—those with the women friends in our lives—there’s never been the fanfare that accompanies the loss of other relationships society deems “more important.” Until now. In Dumped: Stories of Women Unfriending Women, twenty-five established and emerging writers—including Jacquelyn Mitchard, Ann Hood, Carrie Kabak, Jessica Handler, Elizabeth Searle, Alexis Paige, and editor Nina Gaby—explore the fragile, sometimes humorous, and often unfathomable nature of lost friendship. These, like your own, are stories that stay with you—maybe for a lifetime.