The Geriatric Pilgrim: Tales From the Journey

In The Geriatric Pilgrim: Tales from the Journey, Richard Wile explores how his own pilgrimage experiences have shown him that life itself can be a pilgrimage. Part travelogue, part rumination on grief and grace, part coming of (old) age memoir, The Geriatric Pilgrim reveals how viewing life as a pilgrimage can bring us healing and hope.

What others say:

From the green hills of Scotland’s St. Cuthbert’s Way to the Old City of Jerusalem streets to Maine’s piney woods and alongside the bed of his dying daughter, Richard Wile takes the reader on journeys that are haunting and heartbreaking. In achingly beautiful prose, he shares his pilgrimages and moments in which he felt godforsaken and broken, fortunate and blessed. His poignant essays are a hopeful reminder that we all can journey from darkness to light, if we dare to cross the threshold between the past and the present.

— Barbara A. Walsh, author of August Gale: A Father and Daughter’s Journey into the Storm.

The Geriatric Pilgrim: Tales From the Journey, a spiritual memoir-in-essays, is eloquent, humble, and wise. Wile’s essays are beautifully written, deeply moving, and bursting with humanity and love. At times heartbreaking and other moments humorous, this book–a journey through grief to acceptance–is inspiring, and a pure joy to read.   

— Maureen Stanton, author of Body Leaping Backward: Memoir of a Delinquent Girlhood

Like a sage uncle, Rick Wile invites you to tag along as he shares his pilgrimage, his wanderings through life. Ever honest, ever humble, ever wry, Rick never hides his hurts or regrets. At the same time, he doesn’t wallow in the past; as an explorer, he’s always looking to the future, what’s over the next hill, around the next corner. With his mastery at self reflection, Rick helps readers take stock of their own pilgrimages. That is his gift, and that is the magic of this book.

–David Treadwell Writer and fellow explorer

What ultimately shines through this deeply honest book of continuous, light-filled inner journeys (alongside the earthly ones) is the realization that life itself is a pilgrimage. And there are stations (some as humble as a pebble turning under foot, some as soul ravaging as the death of a beloved daughter) along the way. Stations of revelation. Maybe even redemption. If we stop and stay with them a while. It’s a book that offers deep spiritual nourishment to the people who read it.  Not many books do that.  

— Dianne Benedict, author of Tiny Objects (Iowa Short Fiction Award)

…engaging…effective, reflective…—Kirkus Review

To order The Geriatric Pilgrim visit Maine Authors Publishing

Requiem in Stones

The death of his daughter Annie two days before Easter destroys everything Tom Jacobs had ever believed about himself, his teaching career, his new wife, his stepson, and his god. Over the next eighteen Easter seasons, Tom must journey into the heart of his grief before he can emerge, resurrected by faith and love.

Anyone who has ever wondered, “Where in hell is God when a child dies?” will want to read Requiem in Stones.

What others say:

Richard Wile, a widely-published nonfiction writer, uses fiction to lead us through a profound, archetypal Christian journey of suffering, bottoming out, and redemption. Following the death of his child, the narrator loses his faith. He grapples with God as his harrowing spiritual path gradually leads him toward surrender, service, and transcendence.  Requiem in Stones offers spiritual consolation to those who struggle to reconcile grief and belief.

–Lee Hope, Author of Horsefever, a novel

Rick Wile pulls no punches in this urgent novel, taking his protagonist deep into the very marrow of a father’s grief. Tom Jacob’s sojourn becomes, through his encounter with the darkest corners of his complex and cavernous self, a pilgrimage toward peace and a soulful abiding that amounts to a restoration of his devastated faith. The reader who makes this pilgrimage with him may well be similarly restored.

–Richard Hoffman, author of Half the House and Love & Fury

To order Requiem in Stones visit Maine Authors Publishing