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Marie Sharp #2
No! I Don't Need Reading Glasses
Marie may be 'getting on a bit' but it's certainly not getting her down. She's working part time so there are more hours each day to enjoy life.
She has her friends. She has Pouncer, the cat, as well as a darling grandson. And she has Archie to share her bed. All this, plus the Daily Rant's screaming headlines to wake her up in the morning. Life's good.
But nothing stays the same for long. A roller-coaster of a year beckons - a year that contains love and death, laughter and tears and the bizarre decision to take up temporary residence in a tree.
Always funny, often touching, No! I Don't Need Reading Glasses shows that getting on a bit does not mean giving up or even growing up.
She has her friends. She has Pouncer, the cat, as well as a darling grandson. And she has Archie to share her bed. All this, plus the Daily Rant's screaming headlines to wake her up in the morning. Life's good.
But nothing stays the same for long. A roller-coaster of a year beckons - a year that contains love and death, laughter and tears and the bizarre decision to take up temporary residence in a tree.
Always funny, often touching, No! I Don't Need Reading Glasses shows that getting on a bit does not mean giving up or even growing up.
- GenresHumorFictionContemporary
MP3 CD
First published November 12, 2012
5 people are currently reading
261 people want to read
About the author
Virginia Ironside
42 books40 followersVirginia Ironside is best known as one of Britain's leading agony aunts. She started on Woman magazine before moving to The Sunday Mirror and Today newspapers. She now writes a weekly column for The Independant. She also appears regularly on radio and television on such programmes as Radio 4's 'Woman's Hour'. Her many books include self-help titles on subjects such as bereavement, as well as the children's spooky adventure series
Burlap Hall
.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 48 reviews
August 8, 2017
A pleasant read on the advantages and disadvantages of old age.
September 19, 2022
This's is a delightful book. Light, funny, thoughtful... Anybody in the retired age group can relate to this. An amusing read.I recommend it
May 10, 2023
Relatable for those in their prime! Funny in parts…
November 4, 2019
It was always going to be utter fluff but I didn't hate it fully because I managed to read it so quickly and with a newborn in tow. It was trite and felt like a massive caricature of middle class 65 year old woke women, but it at times reminded me of real behaviours I have witnessed in my parents or my in-laws, so I can't pan it entirely. I wasn't impressed by the style of writing however - it fails to maintain the voice of the diary the longer every entry gets and comes off as being quite amateurish overall.
March 10, 2019
Long winded and pointless tale. Retired lady has family move to ny for work while she tries to save the trees in her neighbourhood from being chopped down. Oh and she has a facelift and an almost fling with a younger man while her kind of partner gets dementia, is put in a home and then dies.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 5, 2021
I found this very funny and could relate to many of the main character's experiences but also a few stray moments where I could not which spoilt it as she came across as self obsessed and a bit pompous where she had previously been very pleasing. The sections dealing with dementia were heartbreakingly honest, and the deep love that occurs netween grandparent and grandchild was lovely, but some quite harsh and, I thought anyway, smug observations about others with different beliefs and lives to her own spoilt it as a whole.
February 6, 2018
Very good and funny book :)
October 15, 2018
Gives you a new perspective of life. I'll leave it at that.
October 27, 2018
Even though I didn't find it funny, it did make for relaxing read. Pages are turned without you noticing it which makes the book go very fast
January 14, 2020
Marie's golden years are filled with as much drama - love, laughter and tears - as ever. Which just goes to show that getting on a bit does not mean giving up - or even growing up
January 27, 2021
I found this book rather boring and skipped a lot just to get to end and even that was predictable.
April 29, 2021
Most enjoyable
September 2, 2021
Felt less interested in the main character than poor Archie. Predictable ending.
October 16, 2021
What a delightful book! Even with the more serious notes inside. I laughed out loud, agreed with the main character, and both wanted to finish the book and continue reading forever.
June 25, 2022
As a woman in my 60s, I'm very much enjoying reading this series.
January 20, 2023
What a delightful book!
April 16, 2017
This book has made me feel older . Reading Marie's diary at age of 65 years old has changed my perspective on life. Though she is divorced (but still contact with her ex husband). She had a dementia bf and at the same time interested with a guy who's 10 years younger than her. I admire her being strong woman mentally and emotionally. She's jovial and very independent woman..
May 9, 2018
Lustig liebenswert wie immer. Es geht spannend weiter und bleibt es auch.
July 29, 2020
A few years ago, I read "No! I Don't Want To Join A Bookclub!" by Virginia Ironside. It was a diary of her character, Marie Sharp's sixtieth year and it was that rare thing, a book that was witty, humane and spoke truthfully about getting older.
At the time, I was in my late fifties and it seemed part warning and part reassurance about what was to come.
"No! I Don't Need Reading Glasses!" is the diary of Marie Sharp's sixty-fifth year. My wife and I are both sixty-one and as we listened to this audiobook we kept finding ourselves laughing and saying, "Yes! That's EXACTLY how it is. Why does no one talk about this?"
Structured as one month of journal entries per chapter, the book carries us through Marie coming to term with the reality of being old and having only getting older and dying ahead of her. It's not a gloomy book, in fact, it's filled with humour, but it doesn't dodge the issues that face the old, even comfortably-off, healthy older people with children and grandchildren.
There is some fun as Marie works with her very traditional no-computer-on-my-desk solicitor to make her will. I've found that solicitors can be remarkably coy about this, as if you can make a will without ever discussing why it might be needed. Marie's matter-of-fact conversation, looking at all the combinations of who might predecease whom and what that would mean, made me smile, as did her antics to challenge the local Council's plan to allow a hotel to be built on one of the few remaining green spaces in Shepard's Bush. True, it's mainly used by drug dealers but that's no reason to allow the Council to take the space away.
The book deals, very compassionately but very accurately, with Alzheimer's and how it steals people from us well before they actually die. Then there are the small oddities of being old: the tendency to fall off ladders, the need to wait for your joints to unlock in the mornings, the surprise when strangers treat you as though you're old when all you've done is forget to get your purse out in the checkout queue because you were so angry at the person ahead of you for being so slow, It also covers those occasional mornings when you wake and ask yourself, "Why am I still here? What use am I?" before making a cup of tea and getting on with doing what needs to be done.
The joys and challenges of having your child and grandchild move to another continent, including how inadequate Skype is for really staying in touch is covered.
If you're in your sixties, or you want to know what it's like to be in your sixties, or even if you just want a smile, this is the book you should listen to.
At the time, I was in my late fifties and it seemed part warning and part reassurance about what was to come.
"No! I Don't Need Reading Glasses!" is the diary of Marie Sharp's sixty-fifth year. My wife and I are both sixty-one and as we listened to this audiobook we kept finding ourselves laughing and saying, "Yes! That's EXACTLY how it is. Why does no one talk about this?"
Structured as one month of journal entries per chapter, the book carries us through Marie coming to term with the reality of being old and having only getting older and dying ahead of her. It's not a gloomy book, in fact, it's filled with humour, but it doesn't dodge the issues that face the old, even comfortably-off, healthy older people with children and grandchildren.
There is some fun as Marie works with her very traditional no-computer-on-my-desk solicitor to make her will. I've found that solicitors can be remarkably coy about this, as if you can make a will without ever discussing why it might be needed. Marie's matter-of-fact conversation, looking at all the combinations of who might predecease whom and what that would mean, made me smile, as did her antics to challenge the local Council's plan to allow a hotel to be built on one of the few remaining green spaces in Shepard's Bush. True, it's mainly used by drug dealers but that's no reason to allow the Council to take the space away.
The book deals, very compassionately but very accurately, with Alzheimer's and how it steals people from us well before they actually die. Then there are the small oddities of being old: the tendency to fall off ladders, the need to wait for your joints to unlock in the mornings, the surprise when strangers treat you as though you're old when all you've done is forget to get your purse out in the checkout queue because you were so angry at the person ahead of you for being so slow, It also covers those occasional mornings when you wake and ask yourself, "Why am I still here? What use am I?" before making a cup of tea and getting on with doing what needs to be done.
The joys and challenges of having your child and grandchild move to another continent, including how inadequate Skype is for really staying in touch is covered.
If you're in your sixties, or you want to know what it's like to be in your sixties, or even if you just want a smile, this is the book you should listen to.
March 1, 2014
received this book as part of a Good Reads First Reads
This is the story of Marie - a lady who , having reached the golden years of her life wants to make some changes
She has a friend who is nearer to her own age, a man, who sadly gets dementia, a grandson to keep her youthful but she wants more
She decides to keep a diary of her life - and this is how the book is set out, she joins a green group to save a local park, she wants to take up painting again .......and she wants a face lift
This book has some very funny moment s .......and is you happen to be the same age as Marie then no doubt you will read this book and nod in agreement at some of the things that happen to her
A great read if you like some humour thrown into what is every day life with a few added extras
This is the story of Marie - a lady who , having reached the golden years of her life wants to make some changes
She has a friend who is nearer to her own age, a man, who sadly gets dementia, a grandson to keep her youthful but she wants more
She decides to keep a diary of her life - and this is how the book is set out, she joins a green group to save a local park, she wants to take up painting again .......and she wants a face lift
This book has some very funny moment s .......and is you happen to be the same age as Marie then no doubt you will read this book and nod in agreement at some of the things that happen to her
A great read if you like some humour thrown into what is every day life with a few added extras
April 18, 2013
One of the few books in my collection that I paid full price for -- I wonder if that makes it more disappointing... I should like this book, it's very much my thing. But... Nothing really happens. It's all rather boring. Maybe I wanted more romance? (There is a touch, but it's all rather... Unromantic...) A less self-absorbed main character? A funnier one? I only realised when I was almost finished the book that this is a sequel to No! I Don't Want to Join a Bookclub, and no! I'm not going to read it. I also found it a little bit racist. Yes, disappointing.
September 20, 2014
This is the second book in the story of Marie Sharp, 60-something equivalent of Bridget Jones. I haven't read the first book but that didn't seem to negatively impact of the second instalment.
Marie is aware of age creeping up on her and has to deal with various trials including a campaign against a local property developer, a complicated love life and a family who want to do their own thing.
The book is quite amusing, there are no surprises here, but it's diverting enough to keep the reader amused for a while.
Marie is aware of age creeping up on her and has to deal with various trials including a campaign against a local property developer, a complicated love life and a family who want to do their own thing.
The book is quite amusing, there are no surprises here, but it's diverting enough to keep the reader amused for a while.
August 12, 2018
Oh my, I didn't think I was going to enjoy this book as much as I did . Found it a bit tedious at the start so I sped read a few chapters then came across something I needed answers for, so I flicked backwards and forwards and in the end got to know all the characters within. It did make me smile and made me think of my own Old Age!
February 7, 2015
A very enjoyable read, easy to pick up and put down as it is written in the form of a diary.
This makes it easy to read a few day's entries then go back to it and pick up where you left off.
It's the first Virginia Ironside I've read but I don't think it will be the last if her other books are as good as this one.
This makes it easy to read a few day's entries then go back to it and pick up where you left off.
It's the first Virginia Ironside I've read but I don't think it will be the last if her other books are as good as this one.
November 2, 2014
This is the first book I have read by Virginia Ironside and initially I wondered if it might be just a bit too ... well, silly, but how wrong I was to pre-judge! I adored the character, Marie, and her absolutely spot-on observations of life from a very young pensioner's angle. Full of content, made me smile and not at all silly.
December 1, 2015
Quite humorus and very true in parts. Perhaps that is why I only gave her two stars, some of the things she didn't like, I know I am guilty of, we can't all be like her.
A bit too close to home for me at the moment living with elderly relatives and the dementia factor. Another time I would probably be able to laugh more.
A bit too close to home for me at the moment living with elderly relatives and the dementia factor. Another time I would probably be able to laugh more.
March 13, 2014
Very disappointing...I was looking forward to the quirks based on the back over write-up... But as another reader described, it was just boring. Daily insight into how small Marie's world was... Yawn...
December 18, 2016
As with the reading glasses I totally adored this book and would not hesitate to recommend it to my friends as it's so real and just like us older ones
Not hesitate to recommend it to all my friends especially the older ones .it's funny sad and so true to life
Not hesitate to recommend it to all my friends especially the older ones .it's funny sad and so true to life
Displaying 1 - 30 of 48 reviews