The Daddy Essays: Perspectives from an Unexpected Journey by Neil Turner
Stars: *****
Lingering Hereford Press (2026)
Self-Help/Grief
353 pages
Disclosure: I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. This post contains affiliate links.
Summary: The Daddy Essays is not a parenting manual. It’s a book of stories from a dad who never expected his journey to include the loss of a child, the joy of becoming a stay-at-home father, or the privilege of raising a son with autism—all while learning to laugh, grieve, grow, and find meaning in diaper duty.
Collected here are the most meaningful and entertaining pieces from years of writing: honest snapshots of fatherhood, marriage, love, loss, resilience, and everyday absurdities. Some essays will make you laugh. Some may make you cry. All the essays will enrich your perspective on parenthood.
Told with humility, humor, and a deep affection for family, The Daddy Essays invites readers to dip in and out—one story at a time—on days when they need encouragement, perspective, or a reminder that life’s sweetest joys often sit right beside its hardest truths.
The Daddy Essays
This is a grief book, written like a memoir but with a beautiful undertone of reliving the happy moments. The author lost a child, an indescribable event that someone like me who hasn’t been through it can only imagine. Instead of writing about the loss the whole book he focuses on happy memories and what they taught him and his wife about loss, love and life.
It’s a longer book and it took me a while to read but not because it wasn’t a well written book. It was partly having time and partly mixing it up with a lighter read. It was very well written. The stories were intriguing, even when they were sad. They aren’t in order but I didn’t find myself confused like with some books.
The stories aren’t just about the child who passed. All their family is included in the stories. This makes for a well rounded idea of their family and what they are like. Also this book will probably become a nice heirloom for their kids when they are older.
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