A 92-Year-Old First-Time Author Hits It Out Of The Park

How Gill Johnson found success as a late bloomer with a memoir of a magical summer in Venice in her 20s

Gill Johnson during her Venice summer / David Ross via Hachette

If you’re past the first blush of youth, you may have read stories that make you think you were born in the wrong decade — if not the wrong century — to succeed as a writer. The grim reports tend to go something like this:

• Publishing is a young person’s game. Forget about trying to publish your first book if you’re over 50, let alone 60 or 70.
• If you can find a publisher, you won’t get one of the Big Five. You’re looking at a small press or self-publishing.
• Your book will sink without a trace no matter who publishes it. You can’t get noticed these days unless you’re a Gen Z writer with hundreds of thousands of followers on Instagram.

There’s some truth to all of this. Book publishers do tend to favor young authors for their future earnings potential if not their age. The idea seems to be that signing a recent graduate of a top-tier master’s program is like buying a stock during its initial public offering: Your investment will pay off over the years, if not right away. And a lot of older writers do have to self-publish and count on their most loyal friends and relatives for sales.