Endorsements for 50/40

Dear Fans,

The book is going to the printer this Friday! We are very excited. Meanwhile, our wonderful publisher has collected some awesome endorsements for us. Check them out:

"Good, juicy, inspiring words and ways to live as a gloriously aging soul."
--- SARK author and artist of Fabulous Friendship Festival


What a treasure trove! 50 Ways To Leave Your Forties is a joyful, irreverent (and at the same time, very reverent) enthusiastic, and incredibly informative book. The authors present their suggestions for zestful and meaningful living in wonderfully inviting ways. I loved it!

--Sue Patton Thoele, author of Freedoms After 50, The Courage To Be Yourself, and The Mindful Woman


"So far, the statistics are convincing: everyone ages. How we age, however, is largely a choice. In 50 WAYS TO LEAVE YOUR 40s, Sheila Key and Dr. Peggy Spencer serve up a delectable recipe for healthy aging that is both delicious and joyful."

--Larry Dossey, MD, author of The Extraordinary Healing Power of Ordinary Things

Dipping into this treasure trove of a book makes me want to go back in time so I can leave my 40s again. 50 WAYS TO LEAVE YOUR 40s offers so many creative ideas, so much thoughtful information and is so darn much fun, I’m sure I’d do it more gracefully, heathfully, and happily the second time. Congratulations and thanks to Sheila Key and Peggy Spencer for giving all of us a life-affirming map to follow no matter what our age.

-- Judy Reeves, author of A Writer’s Book of Days

"Sheila Key and Peggy Spencer know that a new decade of life is the beginning, not the end, of something great. With generous helpings of wisdom and wit, 50 Ways to Leave Your 40s is a recipe for joy during what comes next."

-David Niven, PhD, author of The 100 Simple Secrets of Happy People and The
100 Simple Secrets of the Best Half of Life

Not only that, but you can already buy the book on Amazon! See HERE.

The End Is In Sight!

For those faithful fans who do check on us from time to time, you will be pleased to know that this book is almost finished!

Our deadline to have our manuscript to the publisher is August 1, 2007 and we are going to make it! We're very excited. The book, if we may say so, is looking great. The editor thinks so too.

Of course, after the due date there are all kinds of other steps before publication, which puts the publication date in Spring of 2008. Naturally, we will keep you informed!

Guess who stopped by yesterday!

It's Michael Davis and Colleen Anderson, my friends from West Virginia! They stopped through on their way to Taos, by way of Jemez. Colleen and Michael love New Mexico (luckily for us) and visit often, albeit fleetingly.

These are the good people who came up with the title "50 Ways to Leave Your 40s" (Michael's brainchild) and delivered it to my kitchen table on Oct. 13, 2000. Less than an hour earlier that evening, I'd scrawled "I must write a book!" on a stray piece of paper, then, a moment later, "What shall it be about?" Whereupon Colleen arrived for the first of her now customary autumn stays at the Ghost Ranch. It's a writers' gathering; I'll have to get the URL and put it in here...Fall Writing Festival.

Anyway, there was Colleen at my door, all those 6½ years ago, and within a matter of minutes, she was regaling me with the story of a road trip a few months earlier, notably a gift she gave herself on the occasion of a certain "Big Oh" birthday.

...Which is how the book title came up in conversation. I myself was 40 at the time, and we thought for a minute we might write the book together. But in the end, Colleen and Michael --- these two lovelies flanking me in this photograph --- decided, "YOU should write it, Sheila!" And so, at long last, I am.

Speaking of... I'd better get back to it. I'm at exactly the two-thirds point in the manuscript, working on Way #33 today: "Break On Through to the Other Side." Gotta get my MOjo RIsing! Meanwhile, I have handed The Tome (i.e. the 3-ring binder containing the first 32 chapters) over to Colleen and Michael for their critical -- and I do mean critical -- reading. Stay tuned!

Wait! Before I go, I promised C & M that I'd add their links here on my blog. Give me a minute...Here we go: Colleen's and Michael's.

OK, that's better

Wha' Happened?