The Awakening of HK Derryberry

My Unlikely Friendship with the Boy Who Remembers Everything

De: Jim Bradford, Andy Hardin

Narrado por: Milton Bagby

2017 Audie Winner: Inspirational/Faith-Based Non-Fiction Audiobook and Earphones Award from Audiofile Magazine

The Awakening of HK Derryberry is the inspiring story of the amazing relationship between a successful business executive and a young, disabled boy with a dismal future. Little did Jim Bradford know the transformational potential of that friendship—for HK and himself.

HK Derryberry came into the world with the odds stacked heavily against him. He was taken from his unmarried mother’s womb three months prematurely when she was killed in a car wreck. After ninety-six days of seesawing between life and death, HK’s grandmother took him home.

One Saturday morning, Jim Bradford, a successful businessman in his mid-fifties, walked into Mrs. Winner’s Chicken and Biscuits and saw a nine-year-old’s head pressed against a broken plastic boom box with a crooked antenna. He couldn’t help but notice the long, white plastic braces on each of the child’s legs. Mr. Bradford learned that HK’s grandmother had been forced to bring him to the fast-food restaurant where she worked, leaving him to sit alone all day at a small table with only his boom box for company. Every Saturday Jim felt drawn back to the restaurant to meet with HK and began spending every weekend with him.

Eventually it became apparent that buried beneath HK’s severe disabilities was a spectacular ability. He was diagnosed with Highly Superior Autobiographical Memory (HSAM), which enabled him to remember everything that happened to him since the age of three. Less than one hundred people have been diagnosed with HSAM, but none of them have the physical disabilities of HK Derryberry.

In this moving true story, you will:

• Explore Jim and HK’s enduring sixteen-year friendship and the discovery of HK’s remarkable gift of memory
• Be inspired to look deeper into the way you see others
• See how God works in the lives of His children, despite their circumstances

This incredible story shines a light on the struggles and the courage people with physical, emotional, and mental limitations have. Be prepared to see how God works through it all to bring joy into the lives of those who trust Him.

Grace and Friendship

What made the experience of listening to The Awakening of H.K. Derryberry the most enjoyable?

The way that 'Mr.Bradford' took no credit for who H.K. turned out to be. He just walked beside him and guided him to new discoveries about himself, and lead him through example.

What was one of the most memorable moments of The Awakening of H.K. Derryberry?

When Grammy Pearl lost her house. That stabbed me right in my heart. I could feel how worn down and overwhelmed she was at that point in her life.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

Both times that H.K. cried. What courageous moments that first time was considering the reason he cried. He dared to be vulnerable. The second time was, I'm sure, the result of uncertainty and fear of something very unfamiliar for Pearl. God bless H.K.'s acceptance of what is. Of what happened.

Any additional comments?

I loved this story of this unlikely kinship because it spoke of grace without being too churchy. I searched online and found all of the speaking I could find. How uplifting!
And how giving Jim's wife was! She likely thought he was nuts to get so attached to quickly to H.K....until she got bitten, and smitten. I would have too.

You'll enjoy.

This book humbles you, inspires you, and reveals God's love and blessings available to us.

Life-changing

This is the type of story we all need to hear. A story of how one man saw potential in a blind boy with multi disabilities that would change both of their lives forever.

sweet and inspiring

Shows the difference one person really can make in another's life. Brings awareness for disabilities and their abilities.

touching and inspiring!

This is what happens when someone chooses to get involved in someone else's life rather than just continue on with the ease of retirement and comfortable living well-earned.

The author notices a young boy hanging out in a diner for many hours on end and takes an interest. The boy is blind and one leg is shorter than the other. Spending so much time alone has stunted his social skills also, so people shy away from him. His caretaker grandmother lives hand to mouth, and has no resources to give him more.

The crux is not about solving problems with money (although that always helps), but rather getting to know people and really caring. Many lives were changed for the better as a result of this man's odd curiosity about a little, strange boy. Retirement didn't end up as he had planned, but he wouldn't trade it for the world.

The story is heartening and touching, but is written a tad amateurishly, hence the loss of one star. The narration is wonderful, the narrator perfectly delivering the man's age and temperament. This is a delightful story to warm the cockles of your heart.