“Mommy, I used to be a tall baseball player.” “Yes, you will be a tall baseball player someday.” With a look of exasperation, he stomped his foot and hollered. “No! I was a tall baseball player—tall like Daddy!” What was my son trying to say to me? Did he mean . . . he couldn’t mean . . . was he trying to tell me that he was a grown-up in a previous lifetime? At the tender age of two, baseball prodigy Christian Haupt began sharing vivid memories of being a baseball player in the 1920s and ’30s. From riding cross-country on trains, to his fierce rivalry with Babe Ruth, Christian described historical facts about the life of American hero and baseball legend Lou Gehrig that he could not have possibly known at the time. Distraught by her son’s uncanny revelations, Christian’s mother, Cathy, embarked on a sacred journey of discovery that would shake her beliefs to the core and forever change her views on life and death. In this compelling and heartwarming memoir, Cathy Byrd shares her remarkable experiences, the lessons she learned as she searched to find answers to this great mystery, and healing in the lives of these intertwined souls. The Boy Who Knew Too Much will inspire even the greatest skeptics to consider the possibility that love never dies.
www.cathy-byrd.com
Assessment:
Plot: The straightforward (and well handled) plot is enhanced via the way the author's involvement deepens even as her son's innocence is maintained. Readers will find the story compelling.
Prose: The prose is direct and unembellished, which is appropriate given the subject matter. The story moves forward smoothly and is engaging.
Originality: Readers will have encountered similar stories before. However, the baseball angle makes this book feel fresh and original.
Character Development: Cathy is a well developed character who evolves as she is drawn ever deeper into the world of reincarnation and past lives. Her husband remains a cipher, while her son is a charming innocent throughout.
Date Submitted: August 28, 2017
In Byrd’s touching debut memoir, a little boy stuns his parents by declaring that he was the baseball player Lou Gehrig in a previous life.
When Christian Haupt was only a toddler, he was singularly enthralled by the sport of baseball. Although he was still too young to play the game, he talked about it constantly, refused to wear anything else but a baseball uniform, and seemed peculiarly disinterested in other, typical attractions of his peers, including toys, television, or even other children. He also sometimes referred to himself as an alter ego named “Baseball Konrad.” Byrd, Christian’s mother, recorded a video of him playing ball in 2011 and posted it on YouTube in the hope of winning him the privilege of throwing out the first pitch of the season for his beloved Los Angeles Dodgers. The video was a sensation and ultimately led to Christian making a cameo appearance in the 2012 Adam Sandler movie That’s My Boy. It turned out that Christian’s indefatigable enthusiasm was coupled with genuinely precocious athletic talent. Byrd writes that one day in 2011, the young boy, still only 2 years old, started to share information about baseball from the 1920s and ’30s, including some that was esoteric even for avid, adult fans. Then Christian began to relate memories of what seemed like a past adult life as a baseball player; Byrd figured out that Christian believed that he was Hall of Famer Lou Gehrig of the New York Yankees. Byrd was initially unsure what to make of her son’s disclosures and sought counsel from multiple sources, including Jim B. Tucker, a well-known professor of psychiatry and neurobehavorial science. Byrd’s memoir almost reads like a suspenseful novel, and readers are sure to be gripped by the possible explanations she provides for Christian’s seemingly inexplicable memories. She also thoughtfully reflects on her own spirituality and the ways in which her son’s revelations challenged her Christian faith: “I was particularly interested in finding out why the concept of living more than one lifetime was incompatible with Christianity….Much to my surprise, I could not find a single scripture in the Bible that repudiates reincarnation.” On the whole, this is an affecting portrayal of parenthood and an affectionate love letter from a mother to her unusual child.
An eclectic mix of mystery, memoir, and the supernatural.
Five Star Review by Susan Sewell for Readers' Favorite
The Boy Who Knew Too Much (An Astounding True Story of A Young Boy's Past-life Memories) by Cathy Byrd is the fascinating account of a toddler who remembers being Lou Gehrig in another lifetime. The two-year-old toddler is totally captivated and immersed in baseball. As a matter of fact, he is totally obsessed with it. He lives in his miniature Dodger's baseball clothes and cleats and refuses to wear anything else. He plays with his small bat and ball from morning until night. When the toddler surprises his mother with the outrageous statement that he is Lou Gehrig, she is stunned. He describes things from the era in which Lou Gehrig lived and gives her personal information about the legendary man of which he nor any small child his age has access. Needing to know if her son is correct, she begins the search into baseball's early history. What she discovers is phenomenal.
The Boy Who Knew Too Much (An Astounding True Story of A Young Boy's Past-life Memories) by Cathy Byrd is an extraordinary memoir about a mother's journey into her young son's past-life memories and the amazing discoveries that she makes along the way. Despite the implications and far-fetched nature of her toddler's claims and the fact they were outside of her religious belief system, she was willing to go beyond the accepted standard to get answers. Her dogged determination in seeking and sometimes ferreting out the information needed to validate her son's claim to his former identity is admirable. Her loving concern enabled him to accept who he is and helped him ease into this lifetime. This is an amazing story of how far a mother will go to protect and support her child's mental and spiritual well-being. This is a fabulous memoir, and I highly recommend it to those who have had similar experiences, and most especially to those who love incidents that are not conventional, but of a reality beyond our perceived rationality. This book is a winner!
DEADLINE EXCLUSIVE: A story about re-incarnation has just been pre-emptively picked up by 20th Century Fox and Miracles From Heaven producer DeVon Franklin to develop as a feature film. The studio optioned movie rights for the Cathy Byrd book The Boy Who Knew Too Much for Franklin Entertainment.Hired on to adapt is Trouble With the Curve‘s Randy Brown, who now returns to the world of baseball for in the true story about a 2-year-old baseball prodigy named Christian Haupt who began sharing vivid memories of a life he never lived: that of a baseball player in the 1920s and ’30s.Brown and Franklin previously collaborated on Miracles From Heaven. Franklin will produce through Franklin Entertainment alongside Christopher Broughton under his Broughton Entertainment banner. Broughton originally brought the book to Franklin. The Boy Who Knew Too Much will be published by Hay House at the end of this month.From riding cross-country on trains to his fierce rivalry with Babe Ruth, the main character in the book described historical facts about the life of American hero and baseball legend Lou Gehrig that he could not have possibly known at the time. Distraught by her son’s uncanny revelations, Christian’s mother, Cathy, embarked on a sacred journey of discovery that would shake her Christian faith to the core and change their lives forever.
People Magazine
Cathy Byrd’s 2-year-old son, Christian Haupt, was a baseball prodigy who spent countless hours pitching and hitting balls, and insisted on wearing a baseball uniform every day. In 2011 his outstanding abilities even landed the boy a small part in the Adam Sandler movie That’s My Boy.But in her new memoir, The Boy Who Knew Too Much, Byrd shares an even more improbable story that even she had trouble believing at first: She claims that Christian was the reincarnation of baseball legend Lou Gehrig, who played for the Yankees nearly a century ago.Byrd had not believed in reincarnation. But she says she began to explore it based on the statements Christian makes about Gehrig’s life that she says the young child could not have otherwise known.She then confirms his statements through Google searches, radio and TV shows, books and searches of Gehrig archives.When Byrd, a California realtor, told two close friends about Christian’s past life stories he’d share, her friends rejected the notion and one told her, “You really need to get over this, Cathy.”Byrd herself was highly skeptical at first about Christian’s revelations. She writes they began when he blurted out: “Mommy, I used to be a tall baseball player.”When she tells him he will be a tall baseball player someday, he replies: “No! I was a tall baseball player—tall like Daddy!”Still too young to read, and not exposed to any baseball lore from his non-baseball-fan family, Byrd writes that Christian shared baseball history he could not possibly have known, such as players traveling by train to hotels.
Christian has been fascinated by baseball since he was one year old. The little boy could play like an eight-year-old when he was three – but are his gifts on the field genetic, or was he a baseball legend in another life?
“The first time I played baseball, it just felt very natural,” says Christian. When mom Cathy took him to a pro game in Boston, he saw a picture of Babe Ruth and reacted violently, saying “I don’t like him, he was mean to me!” Cathy says, “That’s when I had an inkling that something was going on.”
Watch: Baseball and Softball Safety
When Cathy showed Christian pictures of players from Babe Ruth’s era, he pointed to one man and said, “That’ me!” The player was Yankee great Lou Gehrig. “To have him say these things, it was actually very disturbing. I was concerned,” Cathy says.
“When he was six years old, we went to Lou Gehrig’s grave,” Cathy adds. “He said, ‘Mommy, God gave me a new brain now. It’s really hard to remember.’ It’s as if it faded away like a dream.”
Now Christian and Cathy join The Doctors. When he grows up, he says, he wants to play for the Dodgers. “It has been quite a journey for us,” says Cathy. She says he shared many stories with his family that they didn’t know and he couldn’t have known – “I had to look it up on the computer!” She adds, “I didn’t believe in reincarnation, it wasn’t part of my belief system.”
Watch: Living Forever Digitally
Cathy has written a book, “The Boy Who Knew Too Much,” and says she leaves the question of reincarnation open. “I just provide the evidentiary moments of what occurred in my life, and I kind of leave it up to the reader to interpret it. What came through the most was evidence that our souls survive this earthly existence, and that love can surpass one lifetime.”
“I think if nothing else, it just forces us to think outside of ourselves,” concludes ER Physician Dr. Travis Stork. “Christian, regardless of all the things that happened with you when you were young, you’re living your own life now, and we can’t wait to follow along.”
