Older American Month is celebrated each year in May. This booklist includes personal and public journeys of discovery and activism in fiction and nonfiction titles. (Created by the Older Adults Program Manager, May, 2021)
This Chair Rocks
Applewhite argues that ageism has caught the baby boomers by surprise, but as with other forms of discrimination, it reveals itself on both a personal and institutional/societal level.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View This Chair RocksElderhood
Aronson is a geriatrician who looks at our Act III years by drawing from science, medicine, history, anthropology, literature and popular culture. She shows us how to see aging differently and thus change our experience of elderhood.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View ElderhoodNomadland
Bruder explores the lives of older adults who have taken to the road in recreational vehicles to work in a succession of generally low-paying jobs and formed a community of the houseless but not homeless. The 2021 Oscar winner for Best Picture and Best Director is based on Bruder's expose.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View NomadlandMr. Loverman
Barrington Jedidiah Walker is in his mid-70s, a West Indian living in London, who must figure out how to live openly as a gay man after 50 years of marriage to his wife.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View Mr. LovermanOn the Bright Side
Henrik lives in a Dutch care home and is an active member of the "Old But Not Dead Club." With wry humor, the members of the club address the quotidian indignities of aging. They must also confront the final illnesses of their friends and ultimately their own mortality.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View On the Bright SideEnding Ageism, or How Not to Shoot Old People
A cultural theorist considers ageism as a construct of history and cultures, and explores the reasons for the lack of our ageism consciousness.
Format: Book
Availability: All copies in use
View Ending Ageism, or How Not to Shoot Old PeopleOur Souls at Night
Addie and Louis, both widowed, have known each other for decades in the small town of Holt, Colorado. Quite unexpectedly, Addie has a proposition for Louis, which ultimately shakes both of their quiet lives.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View Our Souls at NightEtta and Otto and Russell and James
Eight-three year old Etta leaves her Saskatchewan farm, walking over 3000 kilometers to the Atlantic Ocean on an epic adventure, interweaving the present with a dose of magical realism.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View Etta and Otto and Russell and JamesLate Bloomers
The publisher of Forbes magazine argues that most of us are late bloomers, even though much attention is given to the wunderkind of Silicon Valley. Karlgaard delves into current brain research, particularly on the brain's adaptability, types of intelligence, and the characteristics of late bloomer strengths.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View Late BloomersChinatown Pretty
Andria Lo's photographs reveal the street style of Asian American elders in six Chinatowns in North America. Through photographs and stories woven from interviews, the authors celebrate complex life histories in addition to a DIY fashion ethic.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View Chinatown Pretty