I cut my teeth as a writer on The Sydney Morning Herald as a staff journalist for six years, where I reported on news, wrote features and became the arts editor of the lift out section The Eastern Herald. I then became a features editor on Follow Me, a glossy Sydney-based arts and fashion magazine. Then everything changed: I was diagnosed with a rare life-threatening condition of the outer brain. My health deteriorated. I was in the late stages of pregnancy at the time. I had a choice: face the idea of about five years left to live or have a risky 12-hour operation. Fortunately, I had a brilliant surgeon. After the neurosurgery, random complications resulted in me losing my memory. Completely. What began with me asking typical ‘Where am I? and ‘Who am I?’ questions left me with uncertainties that lingered for decades. I had a full blown case of retrograde amnesia; rare in life, common in fiction. However, while my ability to read and write at the beginning was negligible, eventually, painstakingly, my memories returned and so did my ability to read and write. In 2022, my memoir about the first three years of this experience, All That I Forgot, was published by a small supportive publisher, Bad Apple Press.
All That I Forgot
What if you woke up in hospital one day thinking you were a girl aged nine, when instead you were a grown woman with a child? While it prompted my publishers to promote it as ‘a gripping true story that reads like a psychological thriller’, what I have written was actually the stuff of my life.
My memoir All That I Forgot, 2022, Bad Apple Press, is available on Amazon Australia (hardcover) and select Australian and New Zealand bookstores. For online purchase go to Amazon AU.
What they have said
‘Stranger than fiction this extraordinary amnesiac memoir will have you wondering if it’s better to remember to forget.’
– Tom Flood
Musician and author Tom Flood runs Flood Manuscripts. His 1989 novel, Oceana Fine, won The Vogel National Award, The Miles Franklin and the Victorian Premier’s Award.
The Australian
‘All That I Forgot is a powerful story, simply told, of an ordinary woman experiencing extraordinary events …‘
‘Howell’s book is a memoir and it is also a page tuner. The reader feels compelled to discover answers Howell herself had to ask …‘
– Tina Allen
Tina Allen is the author of Bill Gibson: Biography of the pioneering cochlear implant surgeon. She is also a medical writer and reviewer of books.
A memoirist’s review
‘Read this memoir. If you have any interest in what happens in that mushy grey thing between your ears; if you’ve ever wondered who you really are; if not knowing what comes next in a story intrigues you; if you just like a story told with an economy of words and unwavering honesty… then read All That I Forgot… ‘
– Mike Cavanagh
Mike Cavanagh is the author of memoirs including One of its Legs are Both the Same and A Pocket Full of Days Parts 1 and 2.