Author: Prill Boyle

ISBN: 1-57860-208-4

The following review was contributed by: Sue Vogan: To read more of Sue's reviews Click Here

The book is a collection of firsts and a fistful of fulfilled dreams in the lives of late-bloomers. After reading this book, you may find that you have a renewed strength with which to reach into the recesses of your heart and see if there's not something else you may want to accomplish before your last breath.

Linda Bach, at age fifty, became a medical doctor. Linda graduates medical school the same year her daughter graduates from college. Bach explains her motivation as a "lot of love" put inside her and it was "somehow being wasted."

When Linda was in the fifth grade, her father suffered his third heart attack and died. She knew she wanted to be a heart doctor, but during the sixties, there were few women in the medical field. She went through pre-med, made it through the interview until she was asked if she had plans for marriage and children. She responded that she did and one of the interviewers responded, "God, I'd hate to be one of your kids." Four months later, Linda received a rejection letter.

That same panel that had voted that Linda should not be accepted into medical school should have been there at her graduation. She was president of her class and bought her own practice shortly after graduation.

At fifty-two, Irma Elder became the first woman to run an automobile franchise in Detroit. Born in Mexico and emigrated with her family to the U.S. in the 1940's. She married in 1963 and Irma's husband died suddenly, leaving housewife-Irma to take over the Ford franchise. Today she owns seven dealerships, sits on a variety of corporate and philanthropic boards, and is the CEO of Elder Automotive Group.

Jean Kelly, age forty-nine, leaves welfare and an abusive marriage to earn a Ph.D. and become interim dean of students at a community college. She left home at fifteen and was pregnant by seventeen. Married to a drug user and womanizer, Jean spent two years in the welfare system. She claims that she's "not really a late bloomer." Starting so far behind, it has just taken her this long to catch up.

She had grown up in a home with no electricity or running water. Her father built the outhouse, worked the garden, and killed the chickens. Jean weeded peanuts to earn school clothes and book money. In the evening, Jean makes the family's dinner and often takes a beating from her mother.

At forty-eight, Jo Fuchs Luscombe was elected to the first of five terms as a Connecticut State Representative. Here was a woman “who never so much as taken charge of a PTA meeting.” And, she lived right next to the author.

Born in Dallas, Texas, Boyle describes Jo as a Texas-style steel magnolia. Standing just barely over five-foot, she isn't afraid to speak her mind; sharing makes Jo feel wonderful. She recalls she and her siblings riding a yellow school bus. There were children standing along the road and Jo was never sure if these kids ever went to school. The students started saving items from their lunch pails to share with the roadside children. The bus driver was fascinated and started slowing down so the children could grab the goodies.

Patricia Symonds, at sixty, joined the faculty of Brown University as a professor of anthropology. She had not graduated high school until she was in her forties. The nuns used to tell Patricia that she was stupid. Worse yet, she believed them. Even now, she says, "I have a Ph.D. and I've pulled the wool over someone's eyes."

Symonds recalls how her whole street was bombed during the war, but she also remembers the Liverpool Museum. "There was an old carousel horse inside that you could get on and ride. This might sound crazy, but I would get on that horse and think about where I wanted to go."

At seventy-one, Evenly Gregory became a flight attendant. Initially rejected by several carriers, she was hired by Mesa Airlines. Today, "she divides her time between teaching flight other attendants and making regular flights in US Airways out of Charlotte, North Carolina."

Mary Orlando, at age sixty-two, bought the historic home she had lived in as a child and turned it into a successful bed-and-breakfast. Somewhere between growing up in a big family that "worked and played together" and after a twenty-nine-year marriage ended, the dream of replicating her childhood was shelved. The, Mary Stuart House in Goshen, Connecticut was opened. She has brought her family back together and provided a place that others with children can share the experience she remembers with fondness.

At thirty-six, Maureen Horkan became an Assistant State Attorney in Jacksonville, Florida. After going from job to job and relationship to relationship, Maureen decided she had to turn her life around. At age thirty-three, Horkan graduated Phi Beta Kappa and went directly to law school.

Forty-seven-year-old Jean Karotkin is a breast cancer survivor and discovers she is a photographer. At thirty-eight, Jean was given a clean bill of health. She took this as her wake-up call -- leaving a difficult marriage, designing a new home for herself, and began her dream of "publishing a book pf photographs of breast cancer survivors." At the age of fifty, she was exhibiting at the "Houston Center for Photography and having her work featured in Oprah and Rosie magazines."

Jane Work, fifty-seven, earns a Ph.D. and becomes a licensed psychologist. She retired last year at the age of eighty-four.

Widowed at age forty-eight, Jane entered college at the height of the Vietnam War. She earned her bachelor's degree at age fifty and a doctorate in psychology only seven years later. At age sixty-three, she opened up a private practice. Currently, she holds workshops at the retirement home where she lives.

Rainelle Burton publishes a critically acclaimed novel at the age of fifty-two. In her life, Rainelle dealt with dyslexia, homelessness, and depression. She raised two boys and worked at Michigan Blue Cross for more than twenty years. Her first novel, The Root Worker, was selected as a Borders Books Recommended Book and a Great Lakes Book Award finalist.

At sixty-five, Wini Yunker joined the Peace Corps and spends two years in Ukraine. In her younger years, she always dreamed of traveling. She graduated high school at age sixteen, was about to flunk out of college so she got married, and was even a beatnik. After the marriage ended, she applied at the local Peace Corps office. When they learned that Wini didn't have a college degree, she was promptly rejected.

Prill Boyle, tired of being a secretary, she attends Georgetown University to earn a degree in English. She graduated when she was thirty-eight. She still hadn't reached her full potential even though she was teaching writing at a community college in Connecticut. She spread her wings and wrote Defying Gravity. The idea was easy, but the progress was slow. Boyle wondered if she had set her goals too high. Boyle, the late-blooming author has brought these heartwarming stories together to weave a tapestry that will hang proudly long after she is gone. In writing the tales of these women, Boyle has told her own story. She claims that if she didn't write this book, she may have died. That's passion. It's presented in a beautiful presentation to read. That's dedication. It's one of the best books I have had the pleasure of reviewing. That's success.