Back in the 1970's Buzz Bissinger, best known for the book Friday Night Lights, watched as his twin boys were born 13.5 weeks early and three minutes and three ounces apart. And although it doesn't seem like it should, those three minutes and three ounces made all the difference to you younger twin, Zach. Because of them, Zach, unlike his brother Gerry, suffered irreparable trace brain damage that have left him mentally retarded, unable to process the abstract, but with a savant's memory, especially in the field of calendaring. This book chronicles a road trip Zach and Buzz made one year to all of the places in the country they had once lived. For Zach, it's a pleasurable chance to visit places and people he wants knew (and still remembers as if it were yesterday), and although he enjoys the trip, he would have rather flown. For Buzz the trip is a much more complicated endeavor that has him trying to reconcile the guilt and difficulties he's had not just with a child with special needs but with his parenting and relationships in general.

And that is where the bulk of the book lies. The road trip provides the metaphorical journey and the setting for various revelations and epiphanies, but real the heart of the book is Buzz coming to grips with his own perceived flaws: his vanity, his insecurities, and his guilt that he still can not set aside the preconceived notions of what a "son" should be as opposed to the son he actually has. When worded that way, the book sounds harsh, and Buzz is harsh on himself. There is no hiding behind his pen; every gut-wrenching, heart-breaking feeling is explored and analyzed, sometimes with devastating consequences. It's one of the most honest, and hard-to-read memoirs I've ever read, yet I had trouble putting it down.