![\"\"](\"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/over-60.jpeg\")
<\/a>Yes, old folks can still write. Maybe better than ever.<\/p>\n
Twenty years ago, Betty Weinhouse, a writer and editor, and David Galef, a writer and creative writing teacher, edited a short story anthology they called 20 Over 40<\/em>. As they say in the preface to this new book, they\u2019d \u201cgrown indignant at all the attention paid to young up-and-coming writers.\u201d So they collected stories by writers who were over 40, to showcase the talent that persists and even blossoms as the years go by.<\/p>\n At the time, they suggested they\u2019d follow up in a \u201cdecade or two\u201d with another book they\u2019d call 20 Over 60<\/em>.<\/p>\n That follow-up anthology has just been published, and reading it is worth your time.<\/p>\n I read the stories in random order, and although I enjoyed the first few, and each was unique, I briefly worried that all the stories were set in nursing homes or some sort of community for older folks.<\/p>\n As I delved further into the book, I realized that was not the case. These stories are greatly varied, as in any worthwhile anthology. The unifying theme is the perspective. The stories are written by authors who have lived through many decades and life changes, and their rich experience is reflected in their writing and in their characters.<\/p>\n The authors include writers with whom I am not familiar as well as authors who are widely known \u2013 Joyce Carol Oates, Paul Theroux and Richard Bausch, to name \u00a0a few.<\/p>\n The stories are variously humorous, sad, eerie, thought-provoking, outrageous \u2013 you name it. All reflect, in different ways, the insights that can be gained through a long life. One of my favorites was a very short story in which a woman chronicles her life \u00a0through the progression of the meals she has made as family circumstances changed.\u00a0 Another follows the adventures of a daring older couple whose hobby is stealing fancy peppermills from restaurants. We read about one single woman\u2019s belated experience with online dating. And there are the nursing home stories, yes, but each of those is fresh and original.<\/p>\n In short, the stories are as diverse as would be those in a collection by writers of any age. We don\u2019t all magically turn into cookie-cutter \u201cold folks\u201d just because we live for many decades. These writers just have more to think about and more experiences to mine as they create their stories.<\/p>\n \n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson 20 OVER 60. Short Stories. Edited by Betty Weinhouse and David Galef. Regal House Publishing. 266 pages. $21.95, softcover. Yes, old folks can still write. Maybe better than ever. Twenty years ago, Betty Weinhouse, a writer and editor, and David Galef, a writer and creative writing teacher, edited a short […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,89],"tags":[1571,1573,1574,143,1572],"class_list":["post-3544","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-contemporary-literary-fiction","category-short-fiction","tag-20-over-60","tag-anthology","tag-older-writers","tag-short-stories","tag-writers-over-60"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3544","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3544"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3544\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3546,"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3544\/revisions\/3546"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}