Things Nobody Knows But Me signed paperback (Australian residents only)

Don't forget to use the discount code DISCOUNT20 (as written) to get 20% off the price!

Signed copy of my memoir Things Nobody Knows But Me published by Transit Lounge plus promotional bookmark and gift. Shipping included for Australian residents only.

‘Brave, compassionate, searingly honest and funny, this is a memoir in a voice like no other. Amra Pajalić’s love letter to her mother is a book that grabs at your heart and doesn’t let go until the final page.’ ALICE PUNG

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When she is four years old Amra Pajalić realises that her mother is different. Fatima is loving but sometimes hears strange voices that tell her to do bizarre things. She is frequently sent to hospital and Amra and her brother are passed around to family friends and foster homes, and for a time live with their grandparents in Bosnia.

At sixteen Amra ends up in the school counsellor’s office for wagging school. She finally learns the name for the malady that has dogged her mother and affected her own life: bipolar disorder. Amra becomes her mother’s confidante and learns the extraordinary story of her life: when she was fifteen years old Fatima visited family friends only to find herself in an arranged marriage. At sixteen she was a migrant, a mother, and mental patient.

Surprisingly funny, Things Nobody Knows But Me is a tender portrait of family and migration, beautifully told. It captures a wonderful sense of bicultural place and life as it weaves between St Albans in suburban Australia and Bosanska Gradiška in Bosnia. Ultimately it is the heartrending story of a mother and daughter bond fractured and forged by illness and experience. Fatima emerges as a remarkable but wounded woman who learns that her daughter really loves her.

Transit Lounge publisher Barry Scott told Books+Publishing the ‘beautifully written’ memoir was ‘a tender, funny and searingly honest story of a bond between mother and daughter, and of the toll that mental illness takes on an individual, a family and a community’.

‘In adolescence, Pajalic becomes her mother’s confidante and learns the extraordinary story of her life: when she was fifteen years old she visited family friends only to find herself in an arranged marriage. At sixteen, she was a migrant, a mother and a mental patient,’ said Scott.

‘With our interest in diverse voices it is a real bonus for us that the book is set in Melbourne’s western suburbs and explores the largely untouched subject of immigrants affected by mental illness,’ he added.

Read the full Books and Publishing announcement here.

Things was featured on Ezvid Wiki a video wiki in a video titled "Authors Of Brutally Honest And Surprising Memoirs"

Things Nobody Knows But Me (Transit Lounge, 2019) shortlisted in 2020 National Biography Award..

Reviews:

..told in a distinctive voice, sharp, direct, sometimes bruising. The Australian

Melbourne's Amra Pajalic opens her heart and soul in this memoir of life with a Mum battling mental illness. Herald Sun

.... there's humour and irony here, such as playful echoes of Jane Austen. The Age

...gritty, poignant and at-times humorous book... Weekly Times

Amid the chaos, Pajalić remains alert to beauty and humour. The Saturday Paper