How to Meet a Man After Forty and Other Midlife Dilemmas Solved by Shane Watson

Shane watson

This could do with having a plain brown wrapper as the slightly misleading title on Shane Watson’s new book needed explaining when it arrived in our house, “It’s for research, honestly”. Middleagedad.com looked alarmed.

In fact it’s not the observations on post-40 dating that were of initial interest to us, it was the chapters on plastic surgery, personal style, being ‘Good For Your Age’ (GFYA) and the concern that we are all turning into our mothers (we’re not) that looked of value.

The chick-lit title and cover illustration belies Shane Watson’s terrifically observant writing style, we love her column in the Sunday Times Style supplement and if you do too it’s worth buying just to get an extended version of her witty banter on the perils of aging.

Her advice on looking GFYA, include:

“Just because you Can doesn’t mean you Should.” (so, so true)

“Everyone has to adapt her style some day. Stevie Nicks is the only exception.”

“Avoid a bob”.

“Don’t move to the country”.

“It’s easy to forget that nothing makes you look quite so youthful as feeling good about life.” (cheesey but very essence of all that matters)

The title of the book refers to Shane’s own (she claims extraordinary) feat of meeting and marrying for the first time when she was over forty. Although she does write insightfully about this and what it’s like to suddenly acquire two or three distinctly unfriendly step children, it is not that unusual today to marry late.

Out of my five oldest friends, two were still unmarried in their early 40s and one remains determinedly so, despite having been asked repeatedly by her current partner. Growing trend?

For research purposes only, I skipped through the dating section which is mostly stuff you already know as it’s what you did in your twenties, only now you can do it all with a better wardrobe and nice shoes.

A good quick read, but might be a little dangerous seen reading it on public transport.

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