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As I have written about motherhood on MojoMom.com for the past six years, I've grappled with the concept of "The Mommy Wars." Is this a real phenomenon? Media-fueled myth? Mass hallucination among all the nation's moms?

I have concluded that there is no full-out "war" as portrayed in the media, but many of us have taken a small sliver of conflict into our hearts, where it can do damage to all mothers. I believe this has happened because all mothers are under such pressure to "do it all" (whatever all means to each family) without enough support that we each start to feel defensive about our own lives. Then we project our own feelings of doubt onto other women who are doing things differently, as though their different life path threatens ours.

In Mojo Mom: Nurturing Your Self While Raising a Family I set out to bridge this conflict by highlighting the common concerns of all mothers. At the heart of it all, moms face many of the same challenges: all-or-nothing career choices, lack of social support, a Second Shift at home even if one has an "enlightened" partner, and a desire to support and care for our families.

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Hella Nation is about a free country.  As a child, when I used to see the Wild West depicted in movies it seemed an ideal American fantasy: a wide open place where anyone could escape from civilization and re-invent himself. In fiction, the frontier was filled mostly with outlaws, swindlers and the odd cultist group, and nefarious as they were they seemed to affirm the absolute freedom of the place. When I was forced to read Huck Finn in middle school, riverboat con artists like the Duke and the King immediately became my favorite characters. Coming of age as I did in an era of mini-malls, corporate rock, anti-smoking laws, and anxiety about children playing with cap guns, it seemed that the days of a wide-open, lawless frontier America had long ago passed.

But when I began to fit the pieces together that make Hella Nation--travels and essays done largely along the West Coast (with one excursion with U.S. troops into the frontier of south Afghanistan) during the past decade--I was struck by the similarities between the actual Americans I have profiled in the present day, and the characters of the mythic West. From the outlaws, to the colorful swindlers, to the young men and women in uniform seeking to avenge 9/11 and bring back bin Laden dead or alive, the American frontier types remain very much alive. In the future, the current era will no doubt seem as violent, half-civilized and filled with as many improbable characters as the Old West appears to us. Hella Nation is filled with dark characters, but as I see them they also affirm that despite the best efforts of many, we remain a defiantly free and often totally untamed people.   

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10. Strong female leads. (I'm told I'm good at this.)
9. Multiple love interests. (Chance & Jesse, check, but I have readers suggesting Booke & Kel, too. Really?! And no, Miranda, under no circumstances will I kill off Eva and match Corine with Chuch, no matter how adorable you find him. Yes, I was picturing Luis Guzman too.)
8. Continuing story arcs. (I love not having to wrap it all up in one book.)
7. There is a plausible reason for an unusually intelligent Chihuahua. You just haven't figured it out yet. (Yes, you can email me your guesses. I don't think you'll ever get it. Until you read it and go, "ohhhhhh.")
6. Two words: haunted diaphragm.
5. Finally, my years of playing D&D pay off, and I can create my own spells!

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The first copy of my new book Fifty Is the New Fifty arrived yesterday from my publisher. My emotions are mixed. On the one hand the book embodies the long-awaited launch of my ideas into the public conversation. On the other hand, it makes me vulnerable to the public's response. Curiously, though, I feel somewhat less vulnerable this time out than when Inventing the Rest of Our Lives was published several years ago. 

This is due in part to the fact that I was in my fifties when I wrote the first book and I am in my sixties now. While being in your sixties makes you more vulnerable to invisibility in some circles, it also sets you free from caring so desperately about what other people think. (And, my friend Robin always adds, caring more about what you think.) That's part of it.  But the main reason is that in the interim I have figured out a thing or two, and I am less confused about what I call Second Adulthood.

I wrote Inventing the Rest of Our Lives because I was totally bewildered about what I was feeling and experiencing. I sensed that I was entering a new stage of life, but I wasn't at all sure I wanted to go there. In the course of many conversations with other women in the same boat, and interviews with people who seemed to have a bit of perspective on what was going on, I began to figure out that Second Adulthood might just be the best stage of all.

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Penguin Group is the Premier Sponsor of the 2009 PEN World Voices Festival

Penguin Group is the premier sponsor of the 2009 PEN World Voices Festival, which takes place April 27th – May 3rd, 2009 in New York City. The festival is the largest celebration of international literature ever produced in the United States. Each year, the PEN America Center brings more than 100 authors to New York for approximately 70 events all around the city in an effort to promote international literature and to address American cultural insularity.

This year, Penguin Group has twelve authors who are scheduled to participate: Paul Auster, Sebastian Barry, Ian Buruma, Joseph Boyden, Niall Ferguson, Philip Gourevitch, Jessica Hagedorn, A.M. Homes, Marlon James, Walter Mosley, Jeffrey Sachs and Anya Ulinich.

To view the complete schedule of events, most of which are free and open to the public, click here.

Get involved! PEN American Center needs volunteers to work front-of-house, back-of-house, and other functions (hospitality suite, receptions, etc.) at this year’s World Voices Festival. Volunteers are asked to spend one full day (approximately 10 a.m. to 9 p.m.) working multiple events and to be prepared to help out in a variety of ways. If you are interested, please e-mail Nick Burd at nick@pen.org with the day(s) of the festival you are available; complete contact information (e-mail address, postal address, and phone numbers); and any foreign languages you may speak (not a requirement) by next Friday, April 10th. Volunteers are asked to attend an orientation meeting at the PEN offices Tuesday, April 13th; Wednesday, April 14th; or Monday April 20th at 6:30 p.m.