“Maybe the reason I have so many hang-ups about the way I look is because there are so many hang downs. Oh, me!” The irrepressible Hattie McNair and her friends at the FairAcres Retirement Home are back!

This time around, a degenerative eye condition doesn’t stop Hattie from participating and recording in her diary all that is going on around her, reminiscing about the past and ruminating on the upcoming millennium. There is much to celebrate and much to lament as Hattie is saddened by the illness of her friend Louly and shocked by a storm that damages many of the homes in her small town. A variety show—complete with a Hattie-led Kitchen Band, washboards, kazoos, and all!—raises money to help the town recover. The end of the year finds the FairAcres crew creating a special holiday celebration with each resident contributing an ornament for the tree and a poignant memory to lift up the spirits.

With grace and humor, Wilder once again gently pokes fun at growing older, all the while reflecting on the special wisdom gained from aging, and the challenges and losses that must be faced.

Join everybody’s favorite busybody, Hattie McNair, and her fellow residents at the FairAcres Retirement Home on another uplifting adventure!

Knee replacement surgery doesn’t slow down the irrepressible Hattie McNair. This time around, she and her fellow residents at the FairAcres Retirement Home are involved in money-making schemes: they enter a car-naming contest and organize a storytelling night to raise money for a swimming pool. There is also mystery in the air when the sour-looking portrait of the retirement home corporation founder, affectionately known as “old Pukey Face,” goes missing, True to form, Hattie makes it her business to get to the bottom of it. And with warm-hearted encouragement (and a little meddling) she lends a hand to her third-grade friend Amanda and her family during a difficult time.

With grace and humor Wilder gently pokes fun at growing older, all the while reflecting on the special wisdom gained from aging, and the challenges and losses that must be faced.

At the age of 92 with more than 500,000 copies of her four best-selling books in print, you’d think that author Effie Leland Wilder would be content to rest on her laurels. Fortunately, in response to the floods of letters requesting another visit to FairAcres, Mrs. Wilder invites us back for another delightfully uplifting and entertaining adventure.

In her familiar journal entries, Hattie takes note of the laughter that lighten the days of her fellow FairAcre “inmates” as well as the tears at the loss of loved ones. Familiar neighbor Mr. C. befriends a young man with some legal troubles and sets him back on the right path, with the assistance of Hattie and company. The residents pitch in to help build a house for a FairAcres employee, demonstrating the same indomitable spirit that has made Wilder’s previous books so popular. And Hattie’s writing success continues as she enters a short story contest. With grace and humor Wilder gently pokes fun at growing older, all the while reflecting on the special wisdom gained from aging, and the challenges and losses that must be faced.

Hattie McNair may be retired, but she certainly hasn’t retired from life. In journals and letters to a friend, Hattie tells the stories of her fellow residents at a retirement home and of the immeasurable gifts and burdens of aging.

Through the histories, hopes, and hijinks of Hattie’s friends and foes, we come to know the Fair Acres folks and to share their triumphs and losses. When they join forces to help an illiterate young handyman, Hattie and company change their lives as well as those of young Arthur Priest and his family. By the time we finish Out to Pasture, we know the pride found in a life lived long and well, and the impact that we can have, no matter our age, on the people—and the world—around us.