A heartwarming, intimate, and amusing memoir of a father’s experience raising his autistic son. When Tom Fields-Meyer’s son Ezra was three and showing early signs of autism, a therapist suggested that the father needed to grieve.
“For what?” Tom asked.
The answer: “For the child he didn't turn out to be.”
That moment helped strengthen the author’s resolve to do just the opposite: to love the child Ezra was, a quirky boy with a fascinating and complex mind. Full of tender moments and unexpected humor,
Following Ezra is the story of a father and son on a ten-year journey from Ezra’s diagnosis to the dawn of his adolescence. It celebrates his growth from a toddler to an extraordinary young man, connected in his own remarkable ways to the world around him. And through Ezra’s eyes, Tom—and, in turn, the reader—gains a new and beautiful understanding of the world.
Tom Fields-Meyer is an author and journalist. A former senior writer for
People, he has written for dozens of publications, including
The New York Times Magazine and
The Wall Street Journal. A native of Portland, Oregon and a graduate of Harvard, he lives in Los Angeles with his wife and their three sons.