In The Company Of Strangers Part 26

Bad Behaviour.

Last Chance Cafe.

Non-fiction

Remember Me.

Getting On: Some Thoughts on Women and Ageing.

MORE BESTSELLING FICTION FROM LIZ BYRSKI.

Last Chance Cafe.

Margot detests shopping malls. Any distraction is welcome, and the woman who has chained herself to the escalator, shouting about the perils of consumerism, is certainly that. She recognises Dot immediately from their campaigning days, and further back still, to when Margot married Laurence.

Dot is in despair at the abandonment of the sisterhood, at the idea of pole dancing as empowerment and the sight of five-year-olds with false eyelashes and padded bras. She's still a fierce campaigner, but she isn't sure where to direct her rage.

Meanwhile Margot holds a haunting resentment that her youthful ambitions have always been shelved to attend to the needs of others. And as the two women turn to the past for solutions for the future, Margot's family is in crisis. Laurence travels in a bid to repress his grief, daughter Lexie loses her job after twenty years, and her younger sister Emma hides her pain with shopping binges.

With aching empathy, Liz Byrski a.s.sembles a fallible cast of characters who are asking the questions we ask ourselves. What does it mean to grow older? Are we brave enough to free ourselves from the pressure to stay young? And is there ever a stage in life when we can just be ourselves?

Bad Behaviour.

One mistake can change a life forever.

Zo is living a conventional suburban life in Fremantle. She works, she gardens and she loves her supportive husband Archie and their three children. But the arrival of a new woman into her son Daniel's life unsettles Zo. Suddenly she is feeling angry and hurt, and is las.h.i.+ng out at those closest to her.

In Suss.e.x, England, Julia is feeling nostalgic as she nurses her best friend through the last painful stages of cancer. Her enthusiastic but dithering husband Tom is trying to convince Julia to slow down. Although she knows Tom means well, Julia cannot help but feel frustrated that he is pus.h.i.+ng her into old age before she is ready. But she knows she is lucky to have him. She so nearly didn't. . .

These two women's lives have been shaped by the decisions they made back in 1968 when they were young, idealistic and nave. In a world that was a whirl of politics and protest, consciousness raising and s.e.xual liberation, Zo and Julia were looking for love, truth and their own happy endings. They soon discover that life is rarely that simple, as their bad behaviour leads them down paths that they can never turn back from.

Trip of a Lifetime.

When Heather Delaney is injured in a shocking act of violence, her life is thrown off course. Struggling to return to work, she is haunted by the incident. Was it random or personal? Will they try again?

Heather is not the only one who is rocked by the attack. Her brother, Adam, and his second wife, Jill, already juggling the demands of work and pre-teen children, find their marriage is straining at the seams. Adam disappears into his music while Jill attempts to keep all the b.a.l.l.s in the air. Shaun, Heather's offsider, young, loyal and ambitious, questions his relations.h.i.+p; Diane, an office volunteer, can't stop the bitterness pouring out after a mid-life divorce; and Heather's aunt, Barbara, is about to have her peaceful rural retirement disrupted by conflicting loyalties.

Then along comes Heather's old flame, Ellis. Romantic, flamboyant, determined to recapture the past and take control of the future, he seems to have all the answers. But can it really be that easy?

NON-FICTION FROM LIZ BYRSKI.

Getting On: Some Thoughts on Women and Ageing.

Published as an ebook by Momentum Books.

Why are we so obsessed with staying young?

In a culture that advocates the pursuit of endless youth and physical beauty how can we embrace the reality, the pleasures and the rewards of getting on? And what does the 'fight against ageing' mean when all women must eventually face the double-standard of ageism and s.e.xism?

Once past fifty, older women begin to sense that they have become invisible. From the visual displays in the mall to the pages of magazines and the television screens at the heart of our homes, young women with perfect skin, bouncy, enhanced b.r.e.a.s.t.s, pouting lips, long straight hair and perfect teeth gaze down on us.

The ageing population is traditionally viewed as a problem; a drain on financial resources, health, housing and community services and a burden on younger generations. But living longer and living well are the triumphs of a civilised society. It is also the future that all generations want for themselves.

Can we change the conversation on ageing? Getting old is tough, but it's also an opportunity to celebrate how far we have come and to shape a different future. In this essay, Liz Byrski examines the adventure of growing old in the twenty-first century: the new possibilities, the joy and the sorrow of solitude, the reality of grief and loss and the satisfaction of having travelled so far.

First published 2012 in Macmillan by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Ltd.

1 Market Street, Sydney 2000.

Copyright Liz Byrski 2012.

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