SeniorLearn

You guys are so supportive of each other. It's really an awesome thing to see. It's proof, too, that not all our undertakings need to be individual, being engaged in something collective, like this site, is itself an important contribution and something of which you can all be justifiably proud.

Though I am only 60, having survived both cancer and a heart attack over the last two decades, I'm well acquainted with the feeling of not knowing how much longer I might be able to work to realize my goals or to enjoy the things I enjoy. But in working on What Should I Do With The Rest of My Life?, it became clear to me, if it wasn't already, that the people I was interested in had a great ability to focus what engaged them and not on questions of "how much longer," of what they could easily have spent time fearing. Just as brain studies have shown us that imaging an act, particularly if we've already had experience with it, causes the brain to fire neural circuitry as if we were doing the act, I suspect there's a neural benefit in directing our free-floating thoughts toward what we want to do. Bruce Frankel, author of What Should I Do With The Rest of My Life?

Many, many thanks for picking my book and for your outstanding conducting of the discussion. All the remarks and comments were so much fun to read -- and really enlightening, too! I think I learned more than the other participants did. Lynne Olson, author of Troublesome Young Men

I'm awed by the depth of the reading you guys have done ... as for the reading I do when I'm preparing.... Reading for research is one of my favorite parts of being a writer. It gives me an excuse to become totally obsessed with a subject and know it's all for a reason. I think it's the part of me that sort of still wishes I'd gone on to get a Ph D, but in a way I think this is more fun, because I get to obsess about one subject or time period for a year or so and then move on to something a little different. Since my novels often use similar themes of mythology and folklore, though, I find that the research for one often sets up the reading for the next book. Carole Goodman, author of The Night Villa

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Maryann McFadden, Author
online discussion of
So Happy Together: August 2010

Bruce Frankel, Author
online discussion of
What Should I Do with the Rest of My Life? True Stories of Finding Success, Passion, and New Meaning in the Second Half of Life: August 2010

Lynne Olson, Author
online discussion of
Troublesome Young Men: The Rebels Who Brought Churchill to Power: April 2010

Matthew Pearl, Author
online discussion of
The Last Dickens: August - October 2009;
online discussion of
The Poe Shadow: September 2006
and
online discussion of
The Dante Club: May 2003

Kirstin Downey, Author
online discussion of
The Life of Frances Perkins: The Woman Behind the New Deal: July-August 2009
Notes from a meeting with Kirstin Downey at the National Book Festival, September 2009.

Geraldine Brooks, Author
online discussion of
People of the Book: July-August 2009
Q&A with Geraldine Brooks

Carol Goodman, Author
online discussion of
The Night Villa: June 2009
SeniorLearn Q&A with Carol Goodman, June 2009
SeniorLearn Interview with Carol Goodman, September 2008

Annie Barrows, Co-Author
online discussion of
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society: February 2009
Q&A with Annie Barrows

Marsha Mehran, Author
online discussion of
Pomegranate Soup: February 2006

Mary Alice Monroe, Author
online discussion of
Sweetgrass: September 2005


Dr. Stanley Lombardo, Author/Translator
online discussion of
The Iliad: October 2004
Dr. Stanley Lombardo Q&A with SeniorLearn, October 2004

Karen J. Fowler, Author
online discussion of
Jane Austen Book Club: June 2004
SeniorLearn Q&A with Karen J. Fowler about The Jane Austen Book Club June 2004

Bruce Feiler, Author
acknowledgement of online discussion of
Walking the Bible: January 2004

Wally Lamb, Author,
and Women of the York Correctional Institution
online discussion of
Couldn't Keep It to Myself: December 2003

Christina Schwarz, Author
online discussion of
All Is Vanity: June 2003

Susan Vreeland, Author
online discussion of
Girl in Hyacinth Blue: May 2003

Dr. Adam Parkes, University of Georgia, Author
Kazuo Ishiguro's The Remains of the Day
Responses to Participants' Questions: in the online discussion of
The Remains of the Day: November 2002

Phyllis Green, Author and mother of Bob Green
online discussion of
Duty: November 2002

David McCullough, Author
Telephone interview with David McCullough by Joan Pearson on:
Truman: September 2002

Jeff Shapiro, Author
online discussion of
Renato's Luck: March 2001

Marilyn Krysl, Author
online discussion of
Best American Short Stories: February 2001

Frederick Reiken, Author
online discussion of
The Lost Legends of New Jersey: January 2001

Greg Kleiner, Author
online discussion of
Where River Turns to Sky: January 2000

Tom Brokaw, TV Newsman & Author
Telephone interview of Tom Brokaw by Joan Pearson on:
The Greatest Generation Speaks: Spring 2000

Leslie Pietrzyk, Author
online discussion of
Pears on a Willow Tree: October 1999

Barbara Shafferman, Author
online discussion of
The President's Astrologer: September 1999

Studs Terkel, Pulitzer Prize Winning Author
Lunch/Q&A Session
Chicago Books Gathering 2000
On The Good War: April 1999

Teresa Bloomingdale, Author
online discussion of
Chicken Soup for the Soul: 1998

Bernard Lefkowitz, Author
online discussion of
Our Guys: November 1998

Dr. Roger Allen, University of Pennsylvania, Author,
Lecturer on NPR, and Friend of Naguib Mahfouz
online discussion of
Palace Walk: September 1998

Thomas Hoving, Author
Former Director Metropolitan Museum of Art
Lunch/Tour/Lecture~Cloisters
NY Books Gathering 1998
King of the Confessors: March: 1998