The Rocket Years: How Your Twenties Launch the Rest of Your Life

The Defining Decade for the #Adulting generation--a book that blends storytelling and data to unpack the choices you make in your twenties, why they matter, and how to turn those critical years into a launchpad for the life you want.

We tend to think of our twenties as a playground for life: A time for low-consequence experimentation and delaying big decisions. But the truth is that while you're muddling through those years--exploring new cities, dating the wrong people, hopping between jobs--a small shift in your flight path can mean the difference between landing on Mars or Saturn.

As the data shows, the choices we make (or put off) during this critical decade about our career, marriage, health, friends, even downtime have the greatest impact on how our lives play out. For example, did you know that people who marry between the ages of 28 and 32 have the lowest risk of divorce? And that the average 25 year old has 20 close friends, but this will shrink to 8 after age 40? And that most of us don't acquire new hobbies after we hit our thirties?

Rather than prescribing one correct path (who are we kidding, there's no such thing anyway ), Elizabeth Segran invites readers to think critically and holistically about the life they want to build. With signature warmth and humor, Segran is the guide we all wish we had to show us the way. Blending insightful anecdotes with research from economics, sociology, and political science, The Rocket Years is an empowering exploration of these exciting, confusing, wonderful years.

Elizabeth Segran spent her childhood in Brussels, Paris, Singapore, and Jakarta. She attended Columbia University, then got a Ph.D. in Indian literature and women's studies from the University of California, Berkeley. She's a senior staff writer at Fast Company, and her work has appeared in a wide range of publications, including The Atlantic, The Nation, Foreign Policy, and the New Republic. She lives in Boston with her husband, daughter, and books.