I began writing my life story when I was 15.
Seventy Thousand Camels
I believed that even by this age I had experienced more than most – and not in a good way.
In 1998 I also believed I had finished my story and had sent it out literally everywhere – including to Oprah Winfrey, with zero result. The story was in fact far from over until now, 2019.
There was no inspiration to write my story as such; the reason I wrote my memoir was in order to offload deep and self-destructive mental anguish. Most therapists tell their clients to write stuff down. Yet, I was always a writer, thus I guess I can call my offloading - artistic therapy?
Originally my 1998 manuscript had strong metaphysical overtones, for it is my special brand of spirituality that began delivering me from my pain. But as the life vicissitudes increased, I realised that my story was also the story of many other women out there, whether wholly or in parts, and so I shifted my focus from yet another version of a Louise L. Hay book to the true, unadulterated, no holds barred life of Angelica A. Brewer, a young Italian migrant to Australia, raised by a narcissist, and the victim (minus the overtones of victimology) of countless petty horrors.
I guess I can add that my husband of six years, Adam Heath Brewer, also inspired me to finish and title this book. The book is dedicated to him after all. Without this man’s support I’m not 100% certain I may have made it. Okay, let’s be a little less melodramatic…I may have not wanted to make it. But wait, what is the title’s relevance you ask? This question has been asked of me umpteenth times and my answer remains the same; you’ll have to get to Chapter 23 to find out.
I feel I’ve encapsulated in this book dozens of multilayered scenarios, some familiar, some completely foreign to many. I’d also like to think that because my experiences are so varied and often punctuated by insurmountable peaks, and cementing troughs, that the reader will find it difficult putting my book down for one reason or another.
Seventy Thousand Camels is not a pretty story, but it does have a happy ending. I have laid myself bare, and re-opened rabid wounds in order to deliver the uppermost, authentic, testimony of a life lived in defiance of all that attempted to subdue it. My written language is eloquent yet colloquially raw where the depiction of real hatred, white hot anger, and true despair is required for an all-encompassing contextual slap in the face. The imagery is at times both poetic and then brutally confronting. The situations and locations are real, all the protagonists and crew exist(ed), and its heroine lives to fight another day, tired, but yet undefeated.
In summary, I guess I can also add that the inspiration for my memoir is you the reader. This is not a self-help book, but it is certainly written with a secondary purpose, to offer hope to anyone feeling crushed by relentless adversity and adversaries, and to open up a discourse about what truly matters in life and how it can be brought to the forefront and maintained. I hope you take from it whatever you need and then pass it on to others in need, with humility, ease, and grace.
Om Shanti Om,
Angelica A. Brewer