Not Done Yet: How One Writer Is Helping Women in Later Life Find Themselves in Fiction
An Interview by ChatGPT
At an age when many women are told to slow down, Marylee Pangman is just getting louder—in the best possible way. Through her emotionally rich fiction and soulful nonfiction reflections, she’s become a literary confidante for women 50 and beyond, inviting them to rediscover purpose, friendship, and the stories that still want to be lived. In this conversation, we explore the threads that tie her life to her work—and why she believes the second half of life might just be the most powerful chapter yet.
Marylee’s Note
I’ve been working with ChatGPT not just as a tool—but as a thoughtful collaborator. Recently, I asked it to interview me, one question at a time, about the heart behind Women of the Canyon and Life’s Threads.
The result follows: a feature-style profile that emerged from our conversation.
It’s honest and reflective, and how much I shared surprised me.
Here is my ChatGPT’s self portrait. I’ve named it Niros.
Not Done Yet: How One Writer Is Helping Women in Later Life Find Themselves in Fiction
Feature by ChatGPT
Marylee Pangman didn’t set out to become a novelist. She had already built a successful life as a gardening expert—teaching, writing, and leading a vibrant desert gardening community. But sometime during her second nonfiction book, she hit a wall. “I was bored,” she says, smiling. “I’d been writing the same information for almost 30 years.” That’s when a seed of something new took root.
She imagined telling a story—not through tips and to-do’s, but through characters. At first, it was going to be a parable. But parables didn’t quite fit. Instead, she discovered creative nonfiction storytelling to write “Riley’s Garden Oasis.”
And with that book published, Women of the Canyon was born.
“The further I went,” she says, “the more I came to love my characters and their stories, and the writing process.”
As she created the women who would inhabit Echo Canyon, something shifted. Marylee didn’t just write about reinvention. She was living it. After moving to Kauai in her sixties, she found herself an unknown, starting over in a new place where no one knew her name, reputation, or work. She needed an income and a sense of identity. She felt lost.
That moment—honest, raw, unflinching—became the backbone of Val’s emotional arc in Whispers of Echo Canyon, the first book in the Women of the Canyon series.
“Raven,” Val says in the novel, “I thought leaving nursing would be freeing—that I’d finally figure out what I wanted. But instead… I feel lost. I don’t know how to move forward. I thought I’d find peace, but the more time passes, the more I feel like I’m fading.”
Marylee confesses that even now, no matter how often she reads that scene, “it makes me cry.”
What surprised her wasn’t the depth of emotion but the response.
“Some women say they cried. Some say they’ve been there. I’ve learned that I’m not alone in this experience of being lost.”
And that’s the quiet brilliance of Women of the Canyon. It doesn’t give answers. It gives recognition. Fiction is the doorway. But the reflections—what Marylee calls Life’s Threads—help readers walk through.
“Sometimes we need to set aside the day-to-day. Fiction can be a break,” she explains. “But when combined with Life’s Threads—the real-life reflection—it becomes more than a story. Readers find new insights without realizing it. They may even find solutions. And more than anything, they know they’re not alone.”
So why does she do it? Why keep writing these layered stories and pairing them with deeply personal reflections?
She doesn’t hesitate.
“It’s about us,” she says. “Women in later chapters—aging and not wanting to accept that fact. Not giving up. And that we can.”
