Dear Will

At forty-one, Will Gerard''s life finally seems to be coming together. He has worked in publishing for years, but only now as a newly minted literary agent based in his hometown of Washington, D.C., has he struck pay dirt. A couple of high-profile sales and a glowing profile of Will in The Washington Post have lent him a measure of fame -- not to mention a flood of mail in the form of unpublishable manuscripts and query letters.

But one letter Will receives is different: It is from a young woman who hints that he might be her biological father. This news plunges Will headlong into his own past, to the childhood he spent in Bangkok, Thailand, during the Vietnam War and the girl he met there (and years later abandoned), who may be the mother of this young woman. What makes Will''s personal journey all the more wrenching and poignant is that it comes in the midst of another pressing dialogue about fatherhood. Six weeks earlier, Will met Annie Leonard, the woman of his dreams, who is childless -- and anxious to become a mother herself.

Dear Will explores the myths and challenges of modern romance and parenthood from the man''s point of view. Author Karl Ackerman has written a funny, perceptive, and honest book about family -- the one you''re born into, and the one you create.