Books
Author Vicki Thomas, 80, Makes the Case Against Retirement as an Ending
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk
Vicki Thomas is 80 years old, has survived two cancers, and just wrote a book arguing that none of that means she’s done. The author of "From Woodstock to Wisdom…A Boomer’s Journey to 80" was recently featured in an Influential Women tribute recognizing her work on aging and reinvention, according to an announcement from her organization, My Future Purpose.
The book itself is a collection of essays, described by its author as candid and often humorous, covering aging, identity, relationships, technology, loss and the search for purpose. Thomas frames the subject through her own generation’s arc: the Baby Boomers who marched and questioned authority in their youth are now, in her telling, confronting ageism and invisibility in later life. According to the announcement, the essays range from caregiving and changing bodies to what she describes as becoming an influencer at 79.
Thomas’s path to writing that book runs through several careers. In the 1970s she became head of marketing and advertising for the Credit Union National Association, working in what was then a male-dominated financial-services industry. She later worked on projects tied to American Express, Prudential Securities and Merrill Lynch focused on women and the pre-retiree market, and spent time at the ABC Television Network before moving into nonprofit work.
That nonprofit work included Purple Heart Homes, which builds accessible housing for disabled veterans; Thomas’s media and outreach work there earned her the $100,000 Purpose Prize from Encore.org in 2013, an award recognizing people over 60 for social-impact work. She has described that period alongside a more personal turning point: a diagnosis of a rare, aggressive cancer that came with a prognosis of three to five years to live, followed two years later by a breast cancer diagnosis. She has adopted the term "bonus year" to describe each year she has lived beyond her initial three-to-five-year prognosis, as noted in the organization’s statement.
Thomas is currently co-founder and Chief Purpose Officer of My Future Purpose, an organization she runs with Joyce Cohen that works with people navigating retirement and life transitions through workshops, speaking engagements and a program called Pathways to Purpose. The organization’s pitch, per the announcement, is a reframing question: not what someone is retiring from, but what they’re still capable of becoming. Thomas is also developing a related project, "From Woodstock to Wisdom: Passing the Mic," intended to bring college students into conversation with older adults about purpose and generational perception.
The book and the broader effort share a label Thomas uses for the movement she’s trying to build: a "What’s Next movement," aimed particularly at older women she says are too often written off as finished contributors.
Studio CarryOnHarry finds the more interesting story here isn’t the memoir itself but the timing: Thomas is explicitly targeting a generation now aging into the questions it once thought it had permanently deferred, and betting there’s an audience for that discomfort stated plainly rather than softened.
Read more People’s Choice stories on Studio CarryOnHarry. Reporting via Live News Vault.
Are you an author with a new release? We’re always looking for books to cover and authors to interview — tell us about yours here.
Press Releases at Studio CarryOnHarry
Related Posts
New Children’s Book Turns a Childhood Playground Wound Into a Lesson on Forgiveness
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Author Lisa Doucette has published "Fatty, You Broke My Tire Swing!", a children's book drawn…
Christian Faith Publishing Releases Pamela B. Craig’s “Tears and a Tiara,” a Family Memoir of Childhood Cancer and Faith
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Pamela B. Craig has released "Tears and a Tiara: A Testimony of Faith, Hope, and…
Dawn E. Scaff Publishes Poetry Collection “God Is Always Near”
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Dawn E. Scaff has published a new poetry collection, "God Is Always Near," through Christian…
New Book “Expelled” Follows One Family’s Fight Against School Bullying — and a Daughter’s Own Expulsion
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Anna Andrews has written "Expelled," a book based on her family's experience with school bullying,…
New Book “Expelled” Follows One Family’s Fight Against School Bullying — and a Daughter’s Expulsion at Age Eleven
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Anna Andrews has written "Expelled," a first-person account of her family's experience with school bullying,…
New Devotional from Cameron Boles Offers Parents a Chronological Bible Guide for Family Discipleship
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Cameron Boles has released "Truth for Their Hearts: A Devotional Equipping Parents to Disciple Their…
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk
Author Lisa Doucette has published "Fatty, You Broke My Tire Swing!", a children’s book drawn from a painful memory of her own childhood, through Christian Faith Publishing.
The story follows a young girl named Lisa who climbs onto a tire swing expecting an afternoon of fun. A fall and a cruel remark from another child instead leave her confused and hurt. With her sister’s help and her faith, she works through the experience and arrives at forgiveness.
Doucette is a wife, teacher, and mother of two sons who has said she experienced the incident firsthand as a child. "I experienced this hurtful event as a child, and rewriting this story with a redemptive ending has allowed me to truly forgive," she said in the announcement. "I believe that forgiveness is the way to heal, and I hope this book helps other children understand that truth."
The book is categorized as juvenile fiction and centers on themes of empathy, agency, and choosing one’s response to cruelty rather than controlling it. The publisher describes it as a tool for helping children navigate hurt and process it through kindness rather than retaliation.
"Fatty, You Broke My Tire Swing!" is available at bookstores and through Apple Books, Amazon, Google Play, and Barnes & Noble.
Studio CarryOnHarry sees value in children’s books that work from a real, specific memory rather than an invented scenario — that specificity is often what makes a book like this land with young readers rather than read as a generic moral lesson.
Read more People’s Choice stories on Studio CarryOnHarry. Reporting via Live News Vault.
Are you an author with a new release? We’re always looking for books to cover and authors to interview — tell us about yours here.
Press Releases at Studio CarryOnHarry
Related Posts
Christian Faith Publishing Releases Pamela B. Craig’s “Tears and a Tiara,” a Family Memoir of Childhood Cancer and Faith
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Pamela B. Craig has released "Tears and a Tiara: A Testimony of Faith, Hope, and…
Dawn E. Scaff Publishes Poetry Collection “God Is Always Near”
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Dawn E. Scaff has published a new poetry collection, "God Is Always Near," through Christian…
New Book “Expelled” Follows One Family’s Fight Against School Bullying — and a Daughter’s Own Expulsion
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Anna Andrews has written "Expelled," a book based on her family's experience with school bullying,…
New Book “Expelled” Follows One Family’s Fight Against School Bullying — and a Daughter’s Expulsion at Age Eleven
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Anna Andrews has written "Expelled," a first-person account of her family's experience with school bullying,…
New Devotional from Cameron Boles Offers Parents a Chronological Bible Guide for Family Discipleship
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Cameron Boles has released "Truth for Their Hearts: A Devotional Equipping Parents to Disciple Their…
Author Ingo Solace Publishes Children’s Book “Hero Boy” Through Page Publishing
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Ingo Solace has released "Hero Boy," a children's book about a young protagonist learning to…
Books
Christian Faith Publishing Releases Pamela B. Craig’s “Tears and a Tiara,” a Family Memoir of Childhood Cancer and Faith
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk
Pamela B. Craig has released "Tears and a Tiara: A Testimony of Faith, Hope, and Love," a memoir recounting her family’s experience after her child was diagnosed with cancer, according to the publisher’s announcement. The book is published through Christian Faith Publishing.
The announcement describes a family life upended by a diagnosis no parent expects to hear, and a narrative that follows the family through what the publisher calls heartache toward spiritual transformation. Craig frames the ordeal as a test of faith rather than only a medical crisis, according to the announcement, with the book positioned as both a personal testimony and an account meant to speak to readers facing their own hardship.
The title itself, pairing "tears" with "tiara," points to the book’s central tension: suffering alongside something the publisher’s description treats as a mark of grace or honor, a framing common in faith-based memoirs that cast a family’s hardest season as also a season of spiritual meaning.
Craig’s memoir joins a steady stream of personal narratives released through Christian Faith Publishing, which works with authors to bring faith-centered stories, often rooted in illness, loss, or caregiving, to print.
Studio CarryOnHarry sees this as part of a durable category of faith-based memoir: narrow in audience, but consistently in demand among readers looking for first-person accounts of hardship read through a spiritual lens.
Read more People’s Choice stories on Studio CarryOnHarry. Reporting via Live News Vault.
Are you an author with a new release? We’re always looking for books to cover and authors to interview — tell us about yours here.
Press Releases at Studio CarryOnHarry
Related Posts
Dawn E. Scaff Publishes Poetry Collection “God Is Always Near”
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Dawn E. Scaff has published a new poetry collection, "God Is Always Near," through Christian…
New Book “Expelled” Follows One Family’s Fight Against School Bullying — and a Daughter’s Own Expulsion
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Anna Andrews has written "Expelled," a book based on her family's experience with school bullying,…
New Book “Expelled” Follows One Family’s Fight Against School Bullying — and a Daughter’s Expulsion at Age Eleven
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Anna Andrews has written "Expelled," a first-person account of her family's experience with school bullying,…
New Devotional from Cameron Boles Offers Parents a Chronological Bible Guide for Family Discipleship
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Cameron Boles has released "Truth for Their Hearts: A Devotional Equipping Parents to Disciple Their…
Author Ingo Solace Publishes Children’s Book “Hero Boy” Through Page Publishing
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Ingo Solace has released "Hero Boy," a children's book about a young protagonist learning to…
Susan Tigert’s New Novel Follows Three Women Bound by Secrets in 1963 New York
Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk Author Susan Tigert has released "The Silence of Friends," a historical novel set in 1963…
-
Books5 days agoArmy Veteran’s New Novel “Sherry Lynn” Follows Soldiers Branded Traitors on a Years-Long Journey Home
-
Books2 days agoNew Devotional from Cameron Boles Offers Parents a Chronological Bible Guide for Family Discipleship
-
Books2 days agoAuthor Ingo Solace Publishes Children’s Book “Hero Boy” Through Page Publishing
-
Books4 days agoPennsylvania Teacher Writes Debut Book on Recognizing and Recovering from Scams
-
Books6 days agoNurse-Turned-Author Meggan Barrett Draws on 20 Years at the Bedside for New Memoir “Barn Side or Seaside”
-
Books4 days agoRetired Ohio Educator Myrna Sanner Publishes Case for Classical Education in New Book