Teen ADHD memoir attracts publicity and readers

Eighteen-year-old Blake Taylor can add “successful author” to his college resume. The author of ADHD & Me: What I Learned From Lighting Fires at the Dinner Table, an absorbing book chronicling a childhood spent dealing with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), has had a series of Bay Area interviews, including a segment on ABC 7 News and a feature in the San Francisco Chronicle, all of which have contributed to brisk sales for the newly released title, which is already in its second printing. Blake was also featured on CNN.com’s Young People Who Rock blog and interviewed on CNN.com Live.

Diagnosed with ADHD at the age of five, Blake recalls having a reputation for impulsive and often reckless behavior, such as launching rockets into neighbors’ swimming pools, setting off alarms at a museum in a quest to touch a T-Rex, and, of course, lighting fires at the dinner table. The insight that these vignettes provide into what it is like to have ADHD is truly fascinating. Blake explains ADHD-related distraction: “I feel as if my mind were a television with the channel changing uncontrollably. In one moment, I’m watching CNN Headline News, in another moment, a documentary about the Roman army, and in a third moment, What Not to Wear on TLC.

Now a student at the University of California, Berkeley, Blake offers, through his own experiences, hope for other young people struggling with ADD or ADHD. Along the way, he has earned the respect and support of experts such as Lara Honos-Webb, Ph.D., author of The Gift of ADHD, and Edward Hallowell, MD, author of Driven to Distraction, both of whom have endorsed his book.

See the the press release for ADHD & Me.

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