How to Be Old

Lessons in Living Boldly from the Accidental Icon

By: Lyn Slater

Narrated by: Lyn Slater

One of Elle's Most Anticipated Nonfiction Books of 2024

A personal memoir in which Lyn Slater, known on Instagram as “Accidental Icon,” brings her characteristic style, optimism, forward-thinking, and rules-are-meant-to-be-broken attitude to the question of how to live boldly at any age.

When Lyn Slater started her fashion blog, Accidental Icon, at age sixty-one, she discovered that followers were flocking to her account for more than just her A-list style. As Lyn flaunted gray hair, wrinkles, and a megadose of self-acceptance, they found in her an alternative model of older life: someone who defied the stereotypes, refused to become invisible, and showed that all women have the opportunity to be relevant and take major risks at any stage of their life. Youth is not the only time we can be experimental.

How to Be Old tells the ten-year story of Lyn’s sixties, the sometimes-glamorous, sometimes-turbulent decade of Accidental Icon. This memoir is about the hopeful and future-oriented process of reinvention. It shows readers that while you can’t control everything, what you can control is the way you think about your age and the creative ways you respond to the changes in your mind and body as they happen. Rather than trying to meet standards of youth and beauty as a measure of successful aging, Lyn promotes a more inclusive and empowering standard to judge our older selves by.

In this paradigm-shifting memoir, Lyn exemplifies that even with its unique challenges, being old is just like any new beginning in your life and can be the best and most invigorating of all of life’s phases, full of rebellion and reinvention, connection and creativity.

Accidental Icon - Embrace Difference

A wonderful book. 🥹
Finding her difference and remaining true to her authentic self was the highlight seen throughout the book for me.
I have appreciated A.I. blogs since I tapped in around 2019. I can still remember longing for the next post. I retired four years ago. My mornings have been filled with journaling my thoughts since my time has become far less frenzied.
This book brought back memories of work, loss, family and raising children, and travel. This book super-sparked my love for fashion and my love for sunglasses (sunnies) 😎 since they were so unlike the norm.
Before retirement, and definitely before the pandemic, I traveled for work and pleasure. My sense of purpose seemed secure. Then the abrupt stop stopped me cold. Several new and unwanted things popped in. I sunk into deep sadness for a period. Writing and journaling soothed me.
Reading this memoir, I realized quickly that our worlds are certainly different, yet I felt a wonderful connection. I consider myself a forever student, a late bloomer. I love learning and for me, I am who I am. Today, I find pleasure in small things.
Wonderful book. I pray it continues to find its way into the hands of those who long to shine forth authentically. Cheers!

Reminding us that we continue to be

This book came at the perfect time as I evolve into my next evolution as a 73 year-old woman enthusiastically embracing a new future.

HOPE for Aging Well

I loved the honesty, vulnerability, enthusiasm, joy, and HOPE in Lyn Slater’s writing. I will recommend this book to every woman I know, both young and getting older.

Not my theme

I’m not into fashion. I had hoped this was more about growing old but I couldn’t relate.

Great story of personal growth

Loved her story about her lifetime personal growth. I believe she should’ve had someone else to read for her; recommend listening at 1.2 or 1.5 speed. If she does read another of her stories, I would recommend she explore varying intonational manners so that it is less about hearing her read and more about her orally telling her story.