Debut memoir · Coming soon
On the Healing Road
After his wife's death from cancer, a father takes his ten-year-old son on a month-long road trip across America, telling him — mile by mile — the full story of the mother he is too young to fully remember.
Advance praise
"A deeply personal and inspiring memoir that will resonate with anyone who has loved, lost, and searched for hope again."
"As someone who has spent a career studying resilience, I was struck by the authenticity of this story. Shane Yerkes doesn't offer easy answers to grief. Instead, he shows that healing unfolds through connection, meaning, and the courage to keep moving forward."
— Keith M. Bellizzi, PhD, MPH
Professor and Resilience Researcher, University of Connecticut
Author of Falling Forward
"Healing is not about forgetting, but about learning to carry love forward into a meaningful tomorrow. I highly recommend this book to anyone who has experienced loss. It is a life-affirming companion that will encourage your soul."
— Jerry Pierson
Author of Carrie's Journal: A Journey Through Life and Loss
The story
Somewhere to put the grief
Three months after Sara's death, Shane Yerkes packs a converted truck, points it west, and drives his ten-year-old son out of the South Carolina Lowcountry. Four years of cancer cost them the woman at the center of their family. The road, he hopes, can give them somewhere to put the grief.
Across nearly a month and dozens of states — from Old Sheldon Church to the Grand Canyon, Yellowstone's bison herds to the South Dakota plains — Shane tells Conor the full story of his mother. How he met Sara at a Halloween football game, all pigtails and laughter. How she argued an idea down to its bones and made every room she entered her own. How she loved her boy with a fierceness that shaped him before he could remember it. And how she fought for four years and refused, to the end, to let cancer define her.
On the Healing Road is the story of a father's struggle to accept widowhood and a son's first encounter with loss. Honest and plainspoken with an undercurrent of hope, it traces the slow turning of a wound into a scar.
From the road
It really happened, and there are pictures
The book opens where the trip did — at Old Sheldon Church in the Lowcountry, brick arches standing open to the sky, at the start of a journey that would run nearly a month.
No crew, no camera bag. Just a father, a ten-year-old, a converted truck, and a phone. See the barbecue joints and the longhorns, the wind farms and the campfires, exactly as they looked.
From the road
Step inside the story
Before the book arrives, read a passage from the journey — typeset the way it will feel on the page.
Before the book
Watch the road they actually drove
Shane filmed the trip as they took it and cut it into eight minutes. The book is what he could not fit in.
Coming soon
Get the cover reveal, release date & pre-order links
The book is on its way. Join the list and you'll be the first to know when it's available — plus early word on signings and tour stops near you.
Pre-order links for Amazon, Bookshop.org, and Barnes & Noble will appear here — join the list to get them first.
Good to know
Frequently asked
What is On the Healing Road about?
On the Healing Road is a memoir about a father and son driving across America after the death of the boy's mother. Three months after his wife Sara died of cancer, Shane Yerkes converted a pickup into an overland camper and drove his ten-year-old son Conor across dozens of states, telling him — mile by mile — the full story of his mother.
Who is Shane Yerkes?
Shane Yerkes is an author and speaker in the South Carolina Lowcountry, and the author of the memoir On the Healing Road. He spent four years as his wife's caregiver through cancer, and now writes and speaks about grief, caregiving, and raising a child through loss.
Is On the Healing Road a true story?
Yes. On the Healing Road is a memoir, drawn from a real, nearly month-long road trip and the four years of cancer and caregiving that led up to it.
Who is On the Healing Road for?
It is written for anyone carrying grief — widows and widowers, cancer caregivers, solo parents, and people helping a child through loss. Readers who have not lost anyone read it as a father-and-son road trip across America.
When is On the Healing Road being released?
A release date has not been announced yet. Join the list and the date and pre-order links go out the moment they are set.
Where did On the Healing Road begin?
It began as a blog of the same name, written from the road as the trip happened. Reader response, and a wish to preserve what the trip taught, turned it into the book.