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Tales of the New Old Age in America
Viking Adult
May 2008
On Sale: May 18, 2008
400 pages ISBN: 0670018848 EAN: 9780670018840 Hardcover
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Self-Help Health
In 1994 New York Times writer Dudley Clendinen’s mother—a
Southern matron of iron will but creaking bones—sold her
house and moved to Canterbury Tower, a geriatric apartment
building with full services and a nursing wing in Tampa
Bay. There she landed in a microcosm of the New Old Age.
Canterbury was filled not just with old Tampa neighbors but
also with strangers from across the country. Wealthy,
middle class, or barely afloat; Christian, Jewish, or
faithless; proud, widowed, or still married; grumpy or dear—
they had all come together, at the average age of eighty-
six, in search of a last place to live and die. A Place Called Canterbury is a beautifully written, often
hilarious, deeply moving look at how the oldest Americans
are living with the reality of living longer. Peopled by
brave, daffy, memorable characters determined to grow old
with dignity—and to help one another avoid the dreaded
nursing wing—A Place Called Canterbury is a kind of soap
opera. Likewise, it is a poignant chronicle of the last
years of the Greatest Generation and their children, the
Boomers, as they are drawn into old age with their parents.
A Place Called Canterbury is an essential read for anyone
with aging parents and anyone wondering what their own old
age will look like.
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