Zaslow first worked at the
Orlando Sentinel, as a writer for that newspaper's
Florida magazine. He then was a staff writer for the
Wall Street Journal from 1983 to 1987 and columnist at the
Chicago Sun-Times from 1987 to 2001. Zaslow gained recognition as the author of an advice column called "All That Zazz", having won a competition (with 12,000 applicants) at age 29 to replace
Ann Landers at the
Chicago Sun-Times. Zaslow's
Wall Street Journal column, "Moving On", as well as his numerous books, focused on life transitions. In September 2007, after he attended the final lecture of
Carnegie Mellon University Professor
Randy Pausch, he collaborated with Pausch on writing
The Last Lecture, released in 2008. The book by Pausch and Zaslow, translated into 48 languages, was a #1
New York Times best-seller, spending more than 110 weeks on the list, and sold more than five million copies. Media coverage included
The Oprah Winfrey Show and an
ABC special hosted by
Diane Sawyer.
The Girls from Ames is a nonfiction book about a group of eleven women friends who grew up together in
Ames, Iowa, remaining friends for forty years. It spent 26 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list, rising as high as #3.
Highest Duty was co-written by Zaslow with Capt.
Chesley Sullenberger, who successfully ditched
US Airways Flight 1549 in the Hudson River in 2009. The book debuted at #3 on the
New York Times list. In 2011, Zaslow collaborated with
Gabby Giffords and her husband, astronaut
Mark Kelly, on their memoir,
Gabby: A Story of Courage and Hope. In January 2012, Zaslow released
The Magic Room: A story about the love we wish for our daughters, a non-fiction narrative set at a small-town Michigan bridal shop, which looked at the lives of a handful of brides and their parents who journeyed to the store's "Magic Room." Zaslow was twice named by the
National Society of Newspaper Columnists as best columnist in a newspaper with more than 100,000 circulation and had received the Distinguished Column Writing Award from the
New York Newspaper Publishers Association. While working at the
Sun-Times, Zaslow received the Will Rogers Humanitarian Award. He appeared on such television programs as
The Tonight Show,
The Oprah Winfrey Show,
Larry King Live,
60 Minutes,
The Today Show, and
Good Morning America. ==Personal life==