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Fragile Innocence: A Father's Memoir of His Daughter's Courageous Journey
Fragile Innocence is the story of a child devastated by pure chance. This moving narrative of a father’s journey to understand and accept the profound changes in his daughter’s life is at once memoir, biography, mystery, and drama, all centered around one remarkable young woman who cannot talk or read or understand language, but who has touched almost everyone she has ever met.
At eighteen months Hillary Reston, a happy, healthy toddler, was struck by a remarkably high fever. On the advice of her doctor, her parents, James Reston, Jr., and Denise Leary, administered Tylenol and anxiously waited for the fever to subside. Five days later it did, but the damage was done. Over the course of the next five months their bubbly, highly verbal child was radically and irrevocably changed. Worse yet, no doctor could explain what evil and still unidentified force had stolen Hillary’s ability to speak or understand language, hurtled her into a seemingly endless cycle of seizures, destroyed her kidneys, and taken her to the very brink of death.
For her parents, discovering what had happened to their child and how to assure the quality of her life became an obsession. This quest for answers would take them from the nation’s hospitals to the office of a pioneering geneticist in Texas and the vaulted halls of the National Institutes of Health.
This very intimate story also personalizes some of the most daunting ethical issues of medicine that society faces today, including stem cell research, animal organ transplantation, diagnosis with the Human Genome Map, and reproductive and therapeutic cloning. Hillary gives these immensely complicated issues a human face, and they are pondered by Reston as a reporter, a thinker, and a father.
In Fragile Innocence author James Reston, Jr., invites us inside his family, candidly sharing the joys and sorrows of raising Hillary.
“This is a book about the first twenty-one years of a child named Hillary. It tells of her battle to live and our family’s struggle to help her survive as best we could, after an evil and still unidentified force robbed her of her language at the age of two, hurtled her into a seemingly endless cycle of brain storms, destroyed her kidneys, and took her to the very brink of death. That is the first half of the story, when life itself was at stake.” —From the Preface
From the Hardcover edition.
At eighteen months Hillary Reston, a happy, healthy toddler, was struck by a remarkably high fever. On the advice of her doctor, her parents, James Reston, Jr., and Denise Leary, administered Tylenol and anxiously waited for the fever to subside. Five days later it did, but the damage was done. Over the course of the next five months their bubbly, highly verbal child was radically and irrevocably changed. Worse yet, no doctor could explain what evil and still unidentified force had stolen Hillary’s ability to speak or understand language, hurtled her into a seemingly endless cycle of seizures, destroyed her kidneys, and taken her to the very brink of death.
For her parents, discovering what had happened to their child and how to assure the quality of her life became an obsession. This quest for answers would take them from the nation’s hospitals to the office of a pioneering geneticist in Texas and the vaulted halls of the National Institutes of Health.
This very intimate story also personalizes some of the most daunting ethical issues of medicine that society faces today, including stem cell research, animal organ transplantation, diagnosis with the Human Genome Map, and reproductive and therapeutic cloning. Hillary gives these immensely complicated issues a human face, and they are pondered by Reston as a reporter, a thinker, and a father.
In Fragile Innocence author James Reston, Jr., invites us inside his family, candidly sharing the joys and sorrows of raising Hillary.
“This is a book about the first twenty-one years of a child named Hillary. It tells of her battle to live and our family’s struggle to help her survive as best we could, after an evil and still unidentified force robbed her of her language at the age of two, hurtled her into a seemingly endless cycle of brain storms, destroyed her kidneys, and took her to the very brink of death. That is the first half of the story, when life itself was at stake.” —From the Preface
From the Hardcover edition.
272 pages, Paperback
First published February 21, 2006
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About the author
James Reston Jr.
25 books65 followersJames Reston Jr. was an American journalist, documentarian and author of political and historical fiction and non-fiction. He wrote about the Vietnam war, the Jonestown Massacre, civil rights, the impeachment of Richard Nixon, and the September 11 attacks.
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
November 6, 2025
A book such as this makes me think of the James Baldwin quote “You think your pain and heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read.” (I mean this in a general sense, not in the personal sense of having gone through anything like what the Reston family have experienced.)
A Fragile Innocence is the account of Hillary Reston, her extremely rare and devastating condition, and the Reston family, as told by her father, the late journalist and documentarian.
The story is harrowing and poignant, and also evocative and profoundly moving.
Reston was a gifted writer, and A Fragile Innocence tells the story of his daughter’s illness with a good deal of insight and discernment. The only reason I don’t give the book 5 stars is that I wish it had delved a bit more deeply into the lives of the other Reston family members - his wife, son, and other daughter - and the myriad ways in which Hillary’s disease became the central focus of all their lives.
But that’s a small quibble. This is a heartbreaking story well told.
4 1/2 stars.
A Fragile Innocence is the account of Hillary Reston, her extremely rare and devastating condition, and the Reston family, as told by her father, the late journalist and documentarian.
The story is harrowing and poignant, and also evocative and profoundly moving.
Reston was a gifted writer, and A Fragile Innocence tells the story of his daughter’s illness with a good deal of insight and discernment. The only reason I don’t give the book 5 stars is that I wish it had delved a bit more deeply into the lives of the other Reston family members - his wife, son, and other daughter - and the myriad ways in which Hillary’s disease became the central focus of all their lives.
But that’s a small quibble. This is a heartbreaking story well told.
4 1/2 stars.
January 20, 2015
While I have to agree with some other reviewers who found Reston's account of his daughter's struggle against some pretty awful circumstances to be curiously bloodless at times, it is nevertheless a powerful story, well-told, of a family's fight for their beloved little girl. Reston's struggle against a sometimes incompetent medical world was particularly vivid to me, particularly in how, at every turn, his family was faced with unwavering "expert" diagnostic conclusions, many of which were ultimately wrong and occasionally to the extreme detriment of his daughter. This is quite simply a very important book, and one that I'm glad I finally got around to reading.
(In the interest of full disclosure, I should mention that I read this book specifically because I was curious as to how Reston's narrative would compare to my own in my book, published about two years later. As a result, I suspect that came into this book predisposed to like it.)
(In the interest of full disclosure, I should mention that I read this book specifically because I was curious as to how Reston's narrative would compare to my own in my book, published about two years later. As a result, I suspect that came into this book predisposed to like it.)
June 23, 2024
Taken from the Goodreads synopsis. "At eighteen months Hillary Reston, a happy, healthy toddler, was struck by a remarkably high fever. On the advice of her doctor, her parents, James Reston, Jr., and Denise Leary, administered Tylenol and anxiously waited for the fever to subside. Five days later it did, but the damage was done. Over the course of the next five months their bubbly, highly verbal child was radically and irrevocably changed. Worse yet, no doctor could explain what evil and still unidentified force had stolen Hillary’s ability to speak or understand language, hurtled her into a seemingly endless cycle of seizures, destroyed her kidneys, and taken her to the very brink of death.
For her parents, discovering what had happened to their child and how to assure the quality of her life became an obsession. This quest for answers would take them from the nation’s hospitals to the office of a pioneering geneticist in Texas and the vaulted halls of the National Institutes of Health."
I found this book both a wonderful read and a dreadful read. James Reston Jr's first part of the book walks you through what life was before the fever and what happened during and after. From there Reston goes on a rant by telling off others on all the things people did not do or should have done. Never once really examining himself or his wife. Yes, I felt they had their own hand in things on getting things done faster and second guessing the ones with degrees in the field. The last few chapters I did not like even a little bit, they were clearly a speech.
Why the three stars? It is still a thought-provoking good book.
For her parents, discovering what had happened to their child and how to assure the quality of her life became an obsession. This quest for answers would take them from the nation’s hospitals to the office of a pioneering geneticist in Texas and the vaulted halls of the National Institutes of Health."
I found this book both a wonderful read and a dreadful read. James Reston Jr's first part of the book walks you through what life was before the fever and what happened during and after. From there Reston goes on a rant by telling off others on all the things people did not do or should have done. Never once really examining himself or his wife. Yes, I felt they had their own hand in things on getting things done faster and second guessing the ones with degrees in the field. The last few chapters I did not like even a little bit, they were clearly a speech.
Why the three stars? It is still a thought-provoking good book.
January 29, 2018
Awesome story, amazing parents, inspiring daughter. Written from the heart. Loved it!
September 1, 2016
This book is popping up everywhere. Terry Gross interviewed Reston a few weeks ago, and Entertainment Weekly ran a long review. Reston writes about his daughter, who has an unknown disease that has left her without the ability to speak or function above a 9-month-old level. It's intriguing. It's also very flawed, in my opinion. Reston carefully documents the name of every doctor and teacher, but never mentions any at home help (yet makes it clear that he and his wife work full time, and believe it's impossible to leave the child alone). He also makes huge statements and completely fails to back them up in any way. His nervous breakdown gets 2 paragraphs, leaving one to wonder if it was just a figure of speech, or an actual episode? I felt that times that the book was a padded version of his daughter's medical record.
November 12, 2012
This was definitely not what I was expecting. I had assumed that the book would be mainly about Hillary and her illness, but it ended up being about her father and his struggles as an author. His daughter seemed to take a backseat for most of the book. I honestly don't think I could recommend this, which is extremely unfortunate. I know there is only so much he can write about since her illness remains undiagnosed, but there was more to her life than him traveling around the world to write his books. I really wish he had included less of his life and more of hers.
February 3, 2010
A sad, but true and inspiring story of a father's anguish watching his daughter grow up with an unknown chronic disease. The author takes the readers through the frustration of not knowing what is wrong with his child, misdiagnoses, and the effect all this has on the family. Well written and moving, it affirms the power of love and family in coping with medical challenges.
May 11, 2010
This book is heart rending as the parents try to find the cause of their daughter's sudden disability at age 2 and traces her life and theirs as they worked through the turmoil of life, including the desperate need for a kidney transplant. The book finishes on the upswing of the miraculous result of the kidney transplant and the coming of age, at 21.
December 27, 2008
A lovely story of a father's and family's love for their disabledd daughter. I especially enjoyed reading of their good experiences at University of Iowa Health Care and of knowing of their family's experience with the University of Illinois where Scotty Reston's papers reside in the main library.
November 20, 2008
Heartfelt father's journey during his third child's illness.
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February 22, 2009A wonderfully loving insight into the struggles of raising a child stricken with disabilities after a brief freak illness.
February 8, 2010
So beautifully written, and it brought me to tears by the end.
June 1, 2011
Excellent record of a family's journey with a disabled child.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews