SYNOPSIS

In her moving new memoir, The Meaning of Matthew: My Son's Murder in Laramie, and a World Transformed (Hudson River Press), Judy Shepard writes about her family: first the joy and frustration of parenting a complicated teenager, then the horror and resolve when that child is the victim of an unspeakable crime, and how it felt to watch her dying son become a symbol for the entire nation. The book is beautiful: heartbreaking, honest, and written with a lovely open voice that makes the familiar story of the Shepard family's loss all the more devastating.