Why am I passionate about this?

As an active senior who seeks outdoor adventures and who cringes whenever I hear someone say, “I’m too old to [fill in the blank]…”, I love both writing and reading books with older characters who believe instead, “You’re never too old.” I’m drawn to stories where older folks defy stereotypes and continue to relish new experiences, especially those involving the things I most enjoy: camping, hiking, and climbing. Toss in some fun and laughter and I’m there! 


I wrote

Book cover of Ellie Dwyer's Great Escape

What is my book about?

Ellie Dwyer, 61, is convinced bad luck comes in threes, and not just garden-variety, oh-well bad luck. How many people…

When you buy books, we may earn a commission that helps keep our lights on (or join the rebellion as a member).

The books I picked & why

Book cover of Trailer, Get Your Kicks!

Diane Winger Why I love this book

What a great combination – time travel and an adventure in a classic RV!

In my opinion, this book is the best of Nortman’s fun Time Travel Trailer series, combining suspense, nostalgia, and time travel with a delightful trip down memory lane – or I should say, a trip along the original Route 66.

By Karen Musser Nortman ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Trailer, Get Your Kicks! as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Lynne McBriar swore her vintage trailer would stay in a museum where it would be safe from further time travel. But when a museum in Texas wants to borrow it, she determines that she must deliver it herself. Her husband Kurt convinces her to take it along Route 66 for research he is doing. What starts out as a family vacation soon turns deadly. Travel can be dangerous any time, but when your trip involves the Time Travel Trailer, who knows where (or when) you will end up?


Book cover of Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk

Diane Winger Why I love this book

This story was beautifully written, remarkable, often amusing, and quite moving.

Lillian is an utterly original elderly woman, and her memories of her fascinating and unique life experiences from the 1930s through the 1980s form the basis of this outstanding novel. Witty, charming, vibrant, and moving.

I couldn’t help but cheer her on as she walked through the streets of New York and brought me along on her journey through memories of her life.

By Kathleen Rooney ,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

NOW A NATIONAL INDIE BESTSELLER

A love letter to city life in all its guts and grandeur, Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk by Kathleen Rooney paints a portrait of a remarkable woman across the canvas of a changing America: from the Jazz Age to the onset of the AIDS epidemic; the Great Depression to the birth of hip-hop.

“In my reckless and undiscouraged youth,” Lillian Boxfish writes, “I worked in a walnut-paneled office thirteen floors above West Thirty-Fifth Street…”

She took 1930s New York by storm, working her way up writing copy for R.H. Macy’s to become the highest paid…


Book cover of The Silken Thread: Five Insects and Their Impacts on Human History

The Silken Thread by Robert N. Wiedenmann,

This is not an insect book--it is a history book, but one that tells the history you didn't learn in school, or it tells the history in a way you never imagined. Five insects had a significant impact on human history. Silkworm moth, Oriental rat flea, human body louse, yellow…

Book cover of Travels with Charley: In Search of America

Diane Winger Why I love this book

Although I had read this classic many years ago, I decided to revisit it recently and found it even more enjoyable this time around.

Steinbeck’s real-life journey across America drew me into an older era in America and brought a fresh and immersive experience to the reader. Charley, the poodle, was an absolute delight.

By John Steinbeck ,

Why should I read it?

17 authors picked Travels with Charley as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

An intimate journey across America, as told by one of its most beloved writers

To hear the speech of the real America, to smell the grass and the trees, to see the colors and the light-these were John Steinbeck's goals as he set out, at the age of fifty-eight, to rediscover the country he had been writing about for so many years.

With Charley, his French poodle, Steinbeck drives the interstates and the country roads, dines with truckers, encounters bears at Yellowstone and old friends in San Francisco. Along the way he reflects on the American character, racial hostility,…


Book cover of A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail

Diane Winger Why I love this book

This is probably the funniest book I’ve ever read. Who knew hiking the Appalachian Trail could be so hilarious?

These true-life adventures – no, better to describe them as misadventures – will delight everyone from experienced hikers to weekend warriors to armchair adventurers. If you need a lift to your day, this is the book to pick up.

By Bill Bryson ,

Why should I read it?

14 authors picked A Walk in the Woods as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

From the author of "Notes from a Small Island" and "The Lost Continent" comes this humorous report on his walk along the Appalachian Trail. The Trail covers 14 states and over 2000 miles, and stretches along the east coast of America from Maine in the north to Georgia in the south. It is famous for being the longest continuous footpath in the world. It snakes through some of the wildest and most specactular landscapes in America, as well as through some of its most poverty-stricken and primitive backwoods areas.


Book cover of Becoming Fearless: Finding Courage in the African Wilderness

Becoming Fearless by Brenda E. Smith,

This page-turner, thrilling adventure thoroughly immerses readers into a dramatic and isolated Tanzanian wilderness, where the author vividly recreates every sensory detail from her memory. You'll hear a lion's roar near your remote tent site, feel the jolts of fear when agitated hippos surround your inflatable raft, feel aching shoulders…

Book cover of So Long, Chester Wheeler

Diane Winger Why I love this book

This story is a gem.

Young Lewis is a believable and relatable character and the aging Chester Wheeler is a classic curmudgeon (at first). Their highly unusual cross-country journey in an old RV is an absolute delight, with both the young man and the old man demonstrating that age is not a barrier to friendship and personal growth.

By Catherine Ryan Hyde ,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked So Long, Chester Wheeler as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Unlikely road trip companions form an unexpected bond in an uplifting novel about the past-lost and found-by the New York Times and #1 Amazon Charts bestselling author.

Lewis Madigan is young, gay, out of work, and getting antsy when he's roped into providing end-of-life care for his insufferable homophobic neighbor, Chester Wheeler. Lewis doesn't need the aggravation, just the money. The only requirements: run errands, be on call, and put up with a miserable old churl no one else in Buffalo can bear. After exchanging barbs, bickering, baiting, and pushing buttons, Chester hits Lewis with the big ask.

Lewis can't…


Explore my book 😀

Book cover of Ellie Dwyer's Great Escape

What is my book about?

Ellie Dwyer, 61, is convinced bad luck comes in threes, and not just garden-variety, oh-well bad luck. How many people have to flee not one, but two natural disasters? In between the wildfire and the hurricane, her husband of nearly forty years suddenly left her for no reason she could fathom, disappearing from her life without a clue to his whereabouts.

Determined to reinvent her life, Ellie sets out on a journey across the country. Along the way to nowhere in particular, she buys a camper, becomes friends with a remarkable octogenarian, and starts to believe that good luck might also come in threes. Or does it? That depends on how she defines good luck.

Book cover of Trailer, Get Your Kicks!
Book cover of Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk
Book cover of Travels with Charley: In Search of America

Share your top 3 reads of 2025!

And get a beautiful page showing off your 3 favorite reads.

1,395

readers submitted
so far, will you?

📚 You might also like…

Book cover of Vanished Ocean

Vanished Ocean by Dorrik Stow,

World-renowned geologist, Dorrik Stow, tells the story of a long-lost ocean, named Tethys Ocean after the Greek goddess of the sea. Tethys lasted for 250 million years of Earth's history, straddling the equatorial world and playing host to the changing life and events that have shaped the planet we inhabit…

Book cover of Red

Red by Evelyn M. Exley,

The wolves of the Wood do more than hunt you… they know your name.

When Red’s life collides with the royal family of Alameth, she is drawn into the haunting mystery of the wolves and the shadowed Wood that preys on her and her people. But as darkness closes in,…

5 book lists we think you will like!

Interested in New York State, time travel, and French travel?

New York State 613 books
Time Travel 440 books
French Travel 42 books