By the end of this year, the U.S. Census projects, 1.5 million female Baby Boomers will have turned 60. And the percentage of Americans older than 65 is rapidly increasing.
"It began with movies that featured romantic scenes with older women, like 'Something's Gotta Give,' and 'Under the Sand' with Charlotte Rampling," says Carol Schneider, executive publicity director of the Random House Publishing Group, which is bringing out Gail Sheehy and Jane Juska's books.
"That paved the way for people writing about the sex lives of older women. This is ground that has not been covered extensively before. We put these books out because there is a market for them."
The truth is that women tend to live longer than men, and finding a partner is often difficult. Of all the books, Juska's is the darkest, especially as she describes her romance at 71, with Graham, 36, with whom she fell deeply in love. But Graham eventually married a woman closer to his own age. "I am moved to tears with longing and love for this man," Juska writes, "with despair and regret for what cannot be."
Indeed, in a telephone interview from Berkeley, Calif., Juska says that since the publication of "A Round-Heeled Woman," in her conversations with older women, "the strongest sense I came away with was yearning."
Source: Dinitia Smith, New York Times, February 16, 2006