The Villages is Florida's Friendliest Town to Retire to. Meet Some Colorful Villagers and Join in the Fun!
Author Jack O'Brien
Jack O’Brien is a happy Villager, quite familiar with how to navigate traffic in The Villages via the many roundabouts that connect village to village. You will hear Google Maps or Waze directing you, “In one-quarter mile, enter the roundabout and take the second exit to stay on Morse Boulevard.” or “In one-quarter mile, enter the roundabout and take the third exit to enter St. James Circle.”
You Will Identify With These Fictitious Characters
This book is written with realism, heart and more than a fair amount of humor and wit. Whether or not you are a Villager, you will identify with O’Brien’s fictitious characters. Especially through the eyes of one over 55 years of age, but also by youngers coping with aging family members and the resultant issues, the funny and not-so-funny stuff that happens.
The Introduction
The Introduction finds a daughter upset with her widower father who lives in The Villages because she is certain that he cannot care for himself properly. You will read how the two sort out this all-too-common dilemma of miscommunication between elder and younger family members.
Readers Will Be Delighted
Readers will be delighted by descriptions of happenings in the 3 Town Squares where live music plays in each, 365 days a year. Except during the days of Covid. The pandemic brought a lack of security and freedom to those who live in T.V. You will be amused by how Villagers coped with those bad days, as described by O’Brien. Back to the Town Squares, a hotbed of activity, where couples go to dance and meet friends. It’s also where singles go, hoping to meet someone they have something in common with.
A chapter named, “The Night the Scars Came Out” deals candidly with talk of growing older, illness, death, divorce and even being awestruck by new romance after 55, 65, 75 and upward. Yes, it’s candid talk and its reality for an aging population trying to eek all the life they can out of remaining years. O’Brien deftly brings this point home in each of his stories, in a sensitive roundabout way, just as he intended.
Roundabout is a Double Entendre
Roundabout is a double entendre in this book. It applies to the traffic patterns in T.V. and to how life seems to flow in a roundabout way, most especially noticeable as we age.
You will laugh at the colorful names of the Villagers, like Melody Arbuckle Prentice. You’ll read about a Florida Black Bear visiting the garden of Melody and you will want to know what happens when they share lunch on a sunny day.
Retirement is for having lots of friends, continuing to be productive and playing. The Villages is a most perfect place to do all of that, with relatively few cares. O’Brien writes about playing golf, joining a choice of clubs that numbers in the thousands, learning the difference between ALEXA and a Lexus car and that it’s possible to discover young love in later life.
Highly Recommended Read
I highly recommend “The Roundabout Way.” Within its 24 stories, readers will be reminded of so many special parts of life and living. The good, the bad and the real. The funny, the dramatic and the emotional. Read these stories all in one sitting or read them one at a time in your own roundabout way. It doesn’t matter, you are sure to enjoy this book completely.
Linda Lee Keenan, Author of “The Journal” & “With Love From Poland”
