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Table of Contents
About the Book
Losing her husband was devastating. Dating at fifty was just undignified.
Debbie had been with George since she was eighteen. When he died of cancer after thirty-two years together, she had to reconcile with a husband who’d died in denial of his illness, leaving behind guilt, regret, and the question she could no longer avoid: Who are you when you’ve always been half of someone else?
Seeking the answer—and trying to outrun loneliness—Debbie found herself doing things she’d never imagined: writing an online dating profile, trying to play well with others, and discovering that many single middle-aged men were single for a reason. She began to feel like the kind of girl you’d mess around with in your Trans Am, but wouldn’t take to the prom. Dating wasn’t so much a search for love as a crash course in what midlife women would tolerate.
But she didn’t need to find another man. She needed to figure out who she was without one.
To do that, she’d need to start over, imagining a new future and letting go of the past. For a former insurance lawyer with anxiety, embracing the unknown did not come easily. But by beginning again, Debbie found something unexpected: hope. The life she had was gone, but she could build a better one worth looking forward to.
Equal part poignant and punchy, Available As Is is a raw, darkly, funny memoir about love, loss, and the messy business of creating a new life when you thought your best years were behind you.
Debbie had been with George since she was eighteen. When he died of cancer after thirty-two years together, she had to reconcile with a husband who’d died in denial of his illness, leaving behind guilt, regret, and the question she could no longer avoid: Who are you when you’ve always been half of someone else?
Seeking the answer—and trying to outrun loneliness—Debbie found herself doing things she’d never imagined: writing an online dating profile, trying to play well with others, and discovering that many single middle-aged men were single for a reason. She began to feel like the kind of girl you’d mess around with in your Trans Am, but wouldn’t take to the prom. Dating wasn’t so much a search for love as a crash course in what midlife women would tolerate.
But she didn’t need to find another man. She needed to figure out who she was without one.
To do that, she’d need to start over, imagining a new future and letting go of the past. For a former insurance lawyer with anxiety, embracing the unknown did not come easily. But by beginning again, Debbie found something unexpected: hope. The life she had was gone, but she could build a better one worth looking forward to.
Equal part poignant and punchy, Available As Is is a raw, darkly, funny memoir about love, loss, and the messy business of creating a new life when you thought your best years were behind you.
Product Details
- Publisher: She Writes Press (September 13, 2022)
- Length: 280 pages
- ISBN13: 9781647422370
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Raves and Reviews
2024 IPPY Awards Gold Winner in Aging/Death and Dying
2023 Readers' Favorite Book Awards Bronze Medalist in Non-Fiction - Grief/Hardship
“This is a deeply personal story but one that Weiss shares with a beguiling openness and wit. A sharply written, heartfelt dating account that proves both enriching and amusing.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“Overall, Available As Is sets out a stunning and bittersweet journey of self-discovery that is elevated above your average memoir by a rare breed of emotional honesty and the magic of a gifted wordsmith laying out the lessons learned along the way.”
—Readers’ Favorite, 5-star review
“A sudden widow at fifty, Debbie Weiss captures the absurdity of modern dating as a grown up. With unexpected humor and much-welcome hope, Available As Is is a deeply moving story of trying to build a new life after loss.”
—Allison Gilbert, author of Listen, World! and Passed and Present
“With unflinching honesty, Weiss lays out her road from loving marriage, to grieving widow, to dating again. Eye-opening to some and painfully relatable to others, Available As Is is brave, authentic, and exceedingly validating for others working to find love in these disconnected times.”
—Ann Garvin, USA Today best-selling author of I Thought You Said This Would Work
“Scorchingly honest, romantic, funny, desperate, and heartbreaking, Debbie Weiss’s memoir Available As is may be the widow’s story of the millennium. Read it and weep. Read it and rejoice.”
—Jacquelyn Mitchard, author of The Deep End of the Ocean
“A brave, honest look into the trials and tribulations of dating as a middle-aged widowed person. Weiss’s debut memoir is at once poignant and entertaining, and ultimately helps us to realize that the most important relationship we'll ever have is the one we have with ourselves.”
—Jenny Lisk, author of Future Widow and host of The Widowed Parent Podcast
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