Please join Sharon Butala at Owl’s Nest Books on Wednesday, September 8 at 7 p.m. for the launch of her 21st book, This Strange Visible Air, Essays on Aging and the Writing Life.

In this incisive collection, Sharon Butala reflects on the ways her life has changed as she’s grown old. She knows that society fails the elderly massively, and so she tackles ageism and loneliness, friendship and companionship. She writes with pointed wit and acerbic humour about dinner parties and health challenges and forgetfulness and complicated family relationships and the pandemic — and lettuce. And she tells her story with the tremendous skill and beauty of a writer who has masterfully honed her craft over the course of her storied four-decade career.

Butala gives us a book to be cherished — an elegant and expansive look at the complexities and desires of aging and the aged, standing in stark contrast to the stereotyped, simplistic portrayals of the elderly in our culture. This Strange Visible Air is a true gift.