Inside a Sandy Hook Father's Fight to Help Bring Down Alex Jones and Reclaim His Daughter's Memory (Exclusive)

"A Father's Fight: Taking on Alex Jones and Reclaiming the Truth About Sandy Hook" by Robbie Parker debuts Tuesday, Nov. 19

It all started with an uncertain smile and a nervous laugh at a press conference a grieving young father didn't even know he was going to be holding.

On Friday, Dec. 14, 2012, Robbie Parker's world imploded when his 6-year-old daughter, Emilie, was among 20 first graders and 6 educators who were killed in one of the worst mass shootings in U.S. history at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.

Inundated with calls from reporters, Parker, a neonatal intensive care unit physician's assistant from Utah, "naively" agreed to make a statement to a Utah news station at a Newtown church for family and friends there to see and hear, he tells PEOPLE.

Shocked when he was met with a throng of reporters and news crews who gathered to hear him honor his beloved daughter's memory the day after the shooting, he smiled nervously and gave an awkward half-laugh when his father made a well-meaning "dad joke" to calm him, he says.

What happened next devolved into an unthinkable nightmare that included years of harassment, hateful name-calling and death threats. Parker and his wife Alissa were still in the firehouse near the school waiting to hear whether Emilie was one of the tragedy's victims when InfoWars host and far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones falsely told his legions of followers that the shooting was a government hoax carried out to restrict gun rights. After seeing Parker smile before the press conference, he declared that Parker was a "crisis actor" who never lost a daughter.

Parker details his unbelievable, gripping journey in his new book, A Father's Fight: Taking on Alex Jones and Reclaiming the Truth About Sandy Hook , which comes out Nov. 19 from Diversion Books.

"What's evil about what Alex Jones did is that he came in and made the very complicated process of grieving, dangerous," says Parker. "He inflicted these lies and conspiracies about who I am and who Emilie was in a way that harmed me and my family. He was doing that because he made millions of dollars. That's what's evil about it."

Joining other victims' families, Parker fought back in court and won. In Oct. 2022, a Connecticut jury awarded Parker, seven other victims' families and an F.B.I. agent nearly $1 billion in compensatory damages after suing Jones for defamation. The next month, the judge added $473 million in punitive damages to the defamation lawsuit.

So much of the grief process was stolen from me."

He also shares some hard truths he learned along the way about why he turned inward to cope with everything coming at him. "Now I can look back and see a full circle, that had been my coping mechanism since right after I had been abused as a child," he says. "It's been an interesting process seeing how Emilie's death helped me heal my own childhood wounds."

And while he was initially hesitant to join other families in their defamation lawsuit against Jones, Parker writes about the jarring incidents that made him finally agree to stand up to him in court.

"Nobody's going to be able to relate to me if they only think about me in terms of fighting Alex Jones in court," he says. "But we've all been through hard things and like me, a lot of people suffer in silence. I came to find that opening up, sharing and connecting with who you are allows you to be able to connect to other people. That's what really brings healing."

What Parker hopes readers take away most from his book are the beautiful memories he has of his kind-hearted, happy-go-lucky little girl and how he wants her legacy to shine on.

On her last day alive, Emilie, "a notoriously early riser," greeted her dad at 6:45 a.m. with a sunny "Bom dia!" and "te amo" in Portuguese, which they were learning together. "After a hug," Emilie skipped off to snuggle Alissa in bed, "because Emilie never simply walked anywhere."

These days, when he thinks of Emilie, Parker says, "I just know that she loves and cares about us just as much as we do about her. And yes, we're separated, but we're connected still. I feel her. And so maintaining that connection, that's what's important."