Still Life at Eighty: The Next Interesting Thing

by Abigail Thomas

In her new memoir, Abigail Thomas ruminates on aging during the confines of COVID-19 with her trademark mix of humor and wisdom, including valuable, contemplative writing tips along the way.

As she approaches eighty, what she herself calls old age, Abigail Thomas accepts her new life, quieter than before, no driving, no dancing, mostly sitting in her chair in a sunny corner with three dogs for company—three dogs, vivid memories, bugs and birds and critters that she watches out her window. No one but this beloved, best-selling memoirist, could make so much over what might seem so little.

Memories fall like confetti, as time contracts, shoots forward, dawdles, and there she is, back in her twenties in Washington Square Park, drinking, having sex with strangers, falling in and out of love, believing in a better world. Whole decades evaporate as she sits in her chair, and a spider takes up residence beside her, who will become her boon companion for the next week.

Sometimes dread arrives, inhabits her body like a shadow and all she can do is write it away, pay attention to what catches her eye, sticks in her brain. Whatever keeps her in the moment.

Pull up a chair, have a cup of tea and enter Abigail Thomas's funny, mesmerizing, generous world.

Genres: Memoir, Nonfiction, Essays, Audiobook, Biography, Humor, Biography Memoir

240 pages, Paperback

Published November 19, 2024

Reviews

[Rick Riordan]

I don't read a lot of memoirs, but I saw a review of this book in The Boston Globe and decided to give it a try. In part, I was interested in hearing the author's reflections about being eighty years old, since I am now sixty, and eighty does not seem like such an unimaginable age. Also, Abigail Thomas is a dog lover, and I will always stop for dogs!

This was a quick read, a collection of very short reflections -- the sort of book I have to force myself to slow down reading so I have time to think about what the author is saying. That in itself is a good lesson, and goes along with what Thomas writes about. One thing I took away from this book is that doing nothing is an art form. As Thomas says, it is not being lazy or failing to act, it is "surviving the day." Boy, can I relate to that in these troublesome times.

Thomas talks about the smallest of things: Forcing oneself to get moving and get to the grocery store. Sharing a house with bugs and learning to be fascinated by them rather than creeped out. Watching the seasons change outside her window. Being pulled into old memories and wondering if she is remembering them correctly, and if that 'correctness' even matters. She seems to have achieved a kind of zen state about not remembering things. For her, one of the advantages of getting old is experiencing things anew, fresh as the first time, even if it's something she forgets on a daily basis.
I found her an amiable companion, both for her openness and her humor. And yes, I loved the stories about her beloved dogs, and what it means to share a life with such loving companions who are, like her, always seeing the world afresh and discovering each day as the next interesting thing.

[Jennifer ~ TarHeelReader · Rating 5 out of 5]

Still Life at Eighty was a thoughtful read/listen (I bought the audio from @librofm) narrated by the author in her warm, comforting voice. Abigail Thomas writes about aging- and also writing itself. Though it’s easy-to-read, this is one to sit with and savor, to look for yourself inside the pages.

I received a gifted copy.

Many of my reviews can also be found on my blog: www.jennifertarheelreader.com and instagram.com/tarheelreader

[Diane Barnes · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked this off the new release shelf at my library because a long time ago I read A Three Dog Life by Thomas and really liked it. That was a memoir about her husband's long rehabilitation and death after an accident. This was not even really a memoir, but snippets of thoughts about aging, her past life, her family, anything that came to mind. There are a few really interesting and funny pieces about bugs of different kinds.

"At eighty you don't expect to learn something knew, at least not every day. However, I am learning something new every day. Granted, it's the same thing, but I learn it over and over with the same startled awareness."

That's just a sample. If you have to grow old, a sense of humor is essential.

[♥ Sandi ❣ · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 stars

An absolutely wonderful book for an older woman. This is the ruminations of Abigail Thomas from the age of about seventy-five to her current age of eighty. It is told in short epiphanies of time and situation. Each vignette is no longer than a page and a half, often being only a paragraph. But my, what those paragraphs say.

I laughed, I cried, I sat and just thought after reading individual pages. How closely this mirrored my own life. I felt heard, I felt like Thomas saw me, and truthfully she was only expressing herself. How nice it is to know that as we age we do not become estranged, but we share the same qualities of others our age. Thomas brings to light the journey we take as we age and I thank her for her understanding and the enlightenment.

[Patricia]

I've been an Abigail Thomas fan for years and she certainly did not disappoint with this her latest book. Reading it on the eve of my 75 birthday contributed to my appreciation. She truly nails what it feels like to slide closer to and actually into the elderly slot. During the first few chapters, I kept feeling like she was writing from directly inside my skin. The way she addresses the sensation of "Dread" was masterful and writing about the things she felt during the Covid lockdown will become an essential historical record of those days. I'm sure she is among only a few older people who have written about the strange prison into which older people found themselves during that time. And then of course there are the wonderful chapters at the end of the book--an appendix if you will-- about writing. Great read for anyone but especially for older women.

[Carol]

I had just started listening to Still Life at Eighty by Abigail Thomas a few weeks back. I was only on chapter 19 of 100, when I was hooked. Now, I'm finished and am sad it is over yet it leaves me with much to think about. I loved the read and love this wise woman, Abigail Thomas, who wrote it.

I must be thinking about words these days as still life could be a calm time of life or as the author feels, the old gal still has life in her. She's got spunk and a unique sense of humor. I'll have to look up her exact words, but she detests being called a senior as the last time she was a senior she was graduating from high school. She prefers to be called an elder. Agreed as a woman, quickly approaching that decade, I really wonder what I would be graduating to.

Within the last pages Thomas tells of her plans for her eighth birthday. I laughed, I almost thought this could be the way to celebrate my own 80th birthday. But then I thought again, and said, no get your own idea, woman

Abigail Thomas narrates this book and it makes sense. It is her story and she tells it well.

[Clif Hostetler · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a book of short essays, some about aging as hinted by the title, but there are many about common everyday subjects that could apply to anyone at any age. Rather than try to describe the book further I've decided to simply copy a number of short excerpts from the book. The quotes as I've shown them do not include their surrounding context as found in the book, so in someways it may not provide an accurate reflection of the author's narrative. But these are the excerpts I found interesting.

I look forward to my next birthday because while 79 is getting up there, 80 has gravitas.

You know you're old when you email a friend about a change in your blood pressure because you know she will be just as interested as you are.

Falling. There's that long, slow moment you know you are falling, a split second of curiosity and excitement. What is going to happen? Followed, alas, by landing.

Mortality keeps life interesting.

I don't believe in heaven, I said, but I know she's there.

I don't reprimand myself for wasting what's left of my life in bed. It's hard work to be conscious of every moment. Besides, napping is not a waste of time.

My memory is full of holes.

Somebody had the brilliant idea of giving these wasps colored construction paper and my God the nests they made look like beautiful misshapen rainbows.

Doing nothing is not meditation. You are not emptying your mind. You are letting it wander around from one thing to another.

Filled with anxiety about one thing or another, one loved one or another, the planet itself.

One day I will be dead as a doornail and what will that be like? Well I'll be dead so all I can do is try to think about what I think about that

If you could map my mind, it would resemble the zigzagging dog prints in an inch of snow.

I adopted "fuck this shit" as my motto during the Trump administration and find it applies to something new every day.

Time is a mystery. It disappears, comes back, disappears again, all the while it's still here.

Most of my memories are freestanding. Think of them as dots, like punctuation, or maybe exclamation points.

You can't change the past, but if you can face it.

[CatReader · Rating 3 out of 5]

In Still Life at Eighty, American writer Abigail Thomas (b. 1941) reflects on age and aging as she approaches her 80th birthday in a series of essays. Having recently read her late father Dr. Lewis Thomas's memoir The Youngest Science, which was published when he was nearing the end of his career and life, I'm struck by their very similar perseverative thought patterns, streams-of-consciousness and obsessions (particularly, etymology). Though this memoir was hit and miss (mostly miss) for me, I am always on the lookout for memoirs written by those in their 70s, 80s and older reflecting back on their lives and careers. I'm linking a few others below.

Further reading: writers' career/life retrospective memoirs
Daring: My Passages by Gail Sheehy | my review
Sleeping with Cats by Marge Piercy | my review

My statistics:
Book 90 for 2025
Book 2016 cumulatively

[Louise Hulewsky · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not for me. Nothing interesting or compelling

[Lin Salisbury · Rating 4 out of 5]

It’s rare that an author invites us to enter the sacristy of her mind as unapologetically as Abigail Thomas. After two short story collections, one novel, and four works of nonfiction, including the memoirs Safekeeping: A Three Dog life; What Comes Next and How to Like It; and Thinking About Memoir, Thomas has primed us to embrace her unconventional, quirky, and irreverent lifestyle
.
Thomas’s newest memoir, Still Life at Eighty; The Next Interesting Thing, is a fresh take on what it means to age in a society that embraces youth. For Abigail Thomas, eighty is letting go – not of life, but of all the expectations with which life burdens us. Throwing out her makeup, taking a nap in the middle of the day, and not feeling guilty about something or everything, Thomas has eighty down. Even during a pandemic. Even at her annual check up when her doctor asks her to count backward by sevens. Even when her beloved dog dies. And despite youthfulness that smacks her in the face – she’s relieved, she writes, when she sees a young woman on the street with her whole life in front of her – relieved because her first thought is thank God that isn’t me.

Thomas muses about small things. The pandemic has forced her indoors, away from people. She focuses on a one-winged wasp, the squirrels burying the carrots she threw out for them yesterday, she learns how to spatchcock a chicken and spatchcocks chicken three days in a row, never eating the chicken, but delights to learn the root of the term from her American Heritage Dictionary of Indo-European Roots, where she also learns the root for death – she thinks it means to flow – but then she realizes she is looking at the wrong reference, dead is dead, she says.

On her eightieth birthday, Thomas gets a tattoo. For her sixtieth birthday, she had a salamander tattooed on her right arm, so this one will go on her left, just the initials FTS, because the salamander hurt too much. Because we’re on the radio, I’ll leave the interpretation up to your imagination. Just know, that it’s trademark Abigail Thomas – irreverent, outrageous, unexpected. So not eighty.

This is a collection of flash memoir – some chapters are a mere paragraph, others three pages long; the threads of a life all woven together with Thomas’s wit and wisdom. You won’t find the secret of life buried here among the sentences and paragraphs, what you will find, however, will be transparency and authenticity – you’ll find a woman who has come to terms with being referred to as elderly … because, frankly, Abigail Thomas’s eighty is nothing you’ve experienced before.

This is Lin Salisbury with Superior Reviews. Listen to my author interviews on the fourth Thursday of the month at 7:00 pm on Superior Reads on WTIP.

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

The perspective of older people fascinates me. Her life wasn't an inspiration to me, but listening to the audiobook felt like I happened to meet a spunky 80 year old in a coffee shop and spent the afternoon listening to her stories - with interest and gratefulness.

[Chrissie Whitley]

March 2025, DNF at 38%. Not to demand a lot from an elderly author penning a memoir about turning eighty, but the essays in this collection, if they can be called that, lacked meaning or depth to me. Many skirted by meaning, but treaded more on the side of me reading random posts written by someone I have no connection to. I was looking for more introspection and less random happenings.

[Jill · Rating 2 out of 5]

Thomas's book, billed as a "memoir" on the cover, offers only disjointed musings that don't come together in any cohesive narrative. And while many of these vignettes are lovely, some feel rather mundane and pointless, like they should've been edited out. If you are looking for a traditional memoir full of fascinating tidbits from a seasoned octogenarian, look elsewhere.

[Antonia Deignan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Abigail Thomas is perfect.

[AMenagerieofWords Deb Coco]

When you drag the shameful thing out of the dark, its power lessens. It's finite. It has edges. You look at it in the light, and in the light you write it down, and in the writing you may find a way to forgive yourself.
Still Life at Eighty
Abigail Thomas

What a beautiful book! Let's start with this cover, which is so stunning I had to check out what was inside, and thank you @librofm @scribner for the gifted audio, which was read by the author and I'll tell you, it's the way to go. Thomas's voice embodies both a fierce spirit and a tough as nails strength that I was instantly drawn into.

Having just lost my father a few weeks ago, I felt compelled to listen to a woman who looks age and the end of life right in the eyes, and fears not. She is quick to affirm that we don't respect age in this country, and I agree wholeheartedly. But you will respect Thomas and want more of her after listening to her vignettes on the perils and joys of getting up in years. Some are laugh out loud funny, some are wistful, some are inspiring. I had never heard of Thomas and wow, she has lived a very interesting life and is quite prolific. She's been married a few times, she lost one husband in a terrible accident, and she is unapologetically honest and frank, which I just love.

From stories about her beloved dogs, to learning to live with an aging body, to lockdown and loneliness, and best of all - why we should all write memoir. I adored this book and would love to sit down and have a long conversation with the author - she's one of the most honest and endearing women I've come across in some time.

No matter what your age, there is wisdom here. No star rating as it’s a memoir, but it’s 5 star worthy.

[Cara · Rating 2 out of 5]

It feels illegal to give a brutal 2 stars to an old woman’s memoir, I’m sorry. I think I placed my finger on it: it feels like Rupi Kaur for old ppl.

The only thing I took from this book is an existential crisis. Oh, and that honestly I might name a daughter Wisteria. Though unfortunately, it sounds like hysteria.

[Karen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Abigail Thomas is on my shortlist of writers I adore. Her writing is so honest, so real. She can make anything interesting and does. Normally I wouldn’t think of picking up a memoir that has a bunch of flash nonfiction pieces and mini-essays about bugs, birds, the food she puts out for rabbits, or the wisteria vine growing in her kitchen. But when Abigail Thomas takes on these life moments, I can’t put the book down. If you’re interested in memoir, aging, or simple pleasures, get the book. If you’re writing memoir, get the book for the appendix - A few thoughts about writing.

[jrendocrine at least reading is good · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5
This is a collection of small pieces of writing - surprisingly small considering the author started in 2015 and finished a year into the pandemic. I'm not sure who I would recommend this to, but it was funny and wry and somehow fortifying.

Jarringly she is apparently the wild daughter of the estimable Lewis Thomas, who it seemed all of us read in college ("Lives of a Cell"). She mentions him once here.

Anyway, Ms Thomas, sitting around in her house in Woodstock with some dogs and a possel of children who love their mama very much and visit often, is looking forward to "the next interesting thing". She thinks about turning 80, and then does on page 189. She smokes, walks with a cane, has dread, spatchcocks chickens and thinks about the full life that she's had. She loves her dogs, her past husbands, a wisteria plant grows across her kitchen, she catches spiders under glass and takes them outside. She is surprised to learn the same things anew every new day. She doesn't apologize.

Really quite a nice book. I learned a few things, but will have to learn them again tomorrow.

[Molly · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not as good as I thought it would be.

[Erin Farrell · Rating 3 out of 5]

Conceptually beautiful. A few too many dictionary definitions and metacognitive ramblings for my taste. We have so much to learn from our elders and from our own lives.

[Diane · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5/5 stars - read by author. a reflection on life and aging. Well done and much to think about.

[Jean Brown · Rating 4 out of 5]

A book from Abigail is like a conversation with a dearest friend. I have read all her books, she never disappoints.

[Greg · Rating 2 out of 5]

DNF. As an octogenarian, I thought this would be more interesting than it really was.

[Elizabeth]

I liked it at first but not sure this book is where you start with this author- maybe better if you know the artist. Some profound comments, some sad and some a bit cringy.

[Esther · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow luv! So many lil tidbits of life captured with heart.

[Magdelanye · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Pushing eighty...I am living in the ever-shifting constancy of now....I write to find out what the back of my mind is doing while I'm doing nothing....to find meaning when meaning is hard to come by."

One of the most interesting things about Abigail Thomas is her unflagging curiosity. At an age when many begin to limit their interests from the state of the world to the state of their bowels, she is still on a quest for understanding.

I write through confusion for clarity. I write for fun....productive times...lackluster times....when it is hard to have faith the next thing will appear- the next interesting thing- and there seems no point to being me. I've been at this long enough to know there will always be a next thing, but I need an open mind.
both quoted passages are from the Introduction .

What am I?
What is this breathing thing I seem to be? p35

I've done a lot of everything and it shows. p6

That's another interesting thing about AT, that she has retained her gusto and gets a thrill from her recollections rather than trying whitewash or dismiss. She does tend to the occasional worry regarding the unreliability of memory and time.

I have a choice. I can worry myself to the ground....Or I can think of my failing memory as an achievement. I am finally living in the moment. p47

I don't even believe in chronology. Time is too weird. It contracts, then it shoots forward (or back), it dawdles, stops still, then suddenly we're twenty years down the road. Whole decades evaporate..... Life isn't a puzzle that needs to fit together perfectly. Life is complicated...stuff overlaps. p205

Earnest without pretention, her accumulated wisdom is casually dispensed.

Doing nothing is not meditation. You are not emptying your mind, you are letting it wander around from one thing to another while you sit still. Some people think that the monkey mind as something to be conquered, or coralled, or even obliterated, but there is nothing wrong with your monkey mind- let it hang by its tail from the ceiling fan if it wants to. p123

...keep looking, because the longer you do, the more you smile. p124


You can't change the past, but if you can face it, both the present and the future will shift. p216

I think the earth is preparing to shrug us off....We've been here a measly 200,000 yrs and have done more damage than a) other species combined. p142

Always take a cookie when the plate is being passed. p43

[Jenny · Rating 4 out of 5]

About a decade ago I read her memoir "A Three Dog Life" and it pulled me out of a deep pit of grief. So when I saw her new book on the shelves in a random shop a few months ago, I felt this rush of warmth, like reuniting with a friend I had loved who, unbeknownst to them, had saved me.

Anyway, reading this felt like catching up with an old friend. Which is a bit of a pun because this book is all about her aging (i.e., turning eighty) AND she has the same refreshing, honest, sassy, somewhat crass but humane spirit that I had appreciated all those years ago.

The effect of her insight was not as electric as it was ten years ago, but I think that says more about me (and where I am) than about her. She does talk a lot about bugs which isn't my favorite thing, so that's also personal. Her writing shines most when she is bold and undeferential. Her getting a tattoo that reads "FTS" (Fuck This Shit) for her 80th birthday was so empowering and hilarious and self-assured and exactly the kind of thing I love most about her. Finally: the last bit about her writing process was beautiful.

[Pooja Palimar · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Still Live at Eighty" is an absolutely lovely read that captivated me from start to finish. Abigail Thomas’s unique vignette style creates a beautiful mosaic of her life, allowing readers to feel a personal connection with her as if we're sharing intimate moments together.

Her exploration of the intricacies of bugs, obsessions, love, tattoos, and the endless small moments that define our existence is both compelling and enthralling. Each vignette is memorable, offering profound insights wrapped in delightful prose. Thomas's ability to weave together these seemingly ordinary experiences into something extraordinary is truly remarkable.

I highly recommend this book to anyone looking for a heartfelt and engaging read. It’s a gem that lingers long after you’ve turned the last page!

[Lindsey · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can't even come closer to explaining how much Abigail Thomas and her writing have meant and continue to mean to me. Her willingness to look at the messiness and boredom and heartbreak and joy that makes up a life, and her refusal to dishonor all that mess by simplifying it to fit a chronological narrative are such gifts. She looks herself straight in the eye and tells herself the truth, and she never apologizes for it. So you, as the reader, can look yourself in the eye as well. I come back to her over and over again, and I learn something new every time. Do yourself a favor. Read everything she's written and then read it again.

[Emily Cribas · Rating 3 out of 5]

For book club! Memorable quotes that make me less afraid of getting old, being disabled, being alone, and dying. The format really inspired me - a diary - to think less rigidly about writing books.