News & Views Oct 17, 2004 Midlife wake-up call

A 50-something author takes a sassy look at menopause.

Nancy Blair, 52, likens hot flashes to "four Chihuahuas camped out in my stomach who seem to get really ticked off at very unpredictable times."  Read more...

H O T   O F F   T H E    P R E S S !

Thank You, Your Opinion Means Nothing to Me:
A Year of Hot Flashes, Flashbacks, and Finding My Voice

From Publishers Weekly

As she turns 50 and enters menopause, Florida writer and glass artist Blair begins a journal to chart her physical and emotional transformations. There are tedious complaints about hot flashes, sleepless nights and weight gain—a kvetch-fest thankfully relieved by Blair’s descriptions of family life. She adores her husband, a kindred artist: "We are mystic misfits, married to the same visual path and passion." Although they have no children, Blair is the primary caretaker for her aging mother—and, for a time, for her stepfather, too. If you haven’t guessed by now, this is not your mother’s menopause. Blair’s tone is both brazen and New Age, and readers will either delight in or despair of sentences that begin: "10:43 am Farted my way through yoga class and fell asleep during final relaxation.... Woke up thinking I miss my red friend, my Moon Time, my flowers, Auntie Flo." The journal’s funniest and richest parts come when Blair compares her life as a teenager in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s with her current lifestyle. When she can’t remember where she parked her car, she wonders if it’s part of aging or an acid flashback brought on by rereading the ‘60s classic Be Here Now. The work’s journal format is limiting—this might have worked better as a narrative memoir. Still, baby boomers will relate.
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Synopsis

A true story about love, healing the past, forgiveness, changes, Big Changes, and waking up to what is real and true and wonderful, one breath at a time. This is a subject that attracts constant media attention and Nancy Blair's story of her life and the changes that take place is an incredibly honest, moving -- and life changing book. It will strike a chord in every reader; it stimulates rather than depresses and offers incredible insight into a life lived.

• Hardcover: 249 pages
• Publisher: ThorsonsElement (September, 2004)
• ISBN: 000716050X

From Harper Collins Publishers Australia

A true story about love, healing the past, forgiveness, changes, Big Changes, and waking up to what is real and true and wonderful, one breath at a time.

This is a subject that attracts constant media attention and Nancy Blair’s story of her life and the changes that take place is an incredibly honest, moving – and life changing book.
It will strike a chord in every reader; it stimulates rather than depresses and offers incredible insight into a life lived.

• 25% of women suffer badly from menopausal symptoms. 50% of women experience mild symptoms.
• For many women the emotional and physical symptoms of the menopause are severe – which makes this book a must read.
• A powerful autobiography about a controversial subject.

See images of the bookcover below:

• MORE BOOKS BY NANCY