Avital Malenky

Author bio

I grew up in an orthodox family in an illegal settlement in the occupied territories. By the time I was eighteen years old, I had realized I did not believe in God and had rebelled and left the religious lifestyle to join the army. I spent 2 years in Army Intelligence in a top-secret assignment and upon my release left for six months to travel to India and Nepal by myself. When I came back to Israel I studied psychotherapy and met my now husband, Amir. After getting married, we underwent seven years of fertility treatments to conceive. I had lost two children at childbirth, year after year, which left me suffering from complex post-traumatic stress disorder. Eventually, I gave birth to my son who was diagnosed with autism. He is non-verbal and attends a special education needs school as well as being treated at home by us. I eventually left the job market in order to care for him full-time. I started working at eight years old as a babysitter since my parents believed there was no such thing as a free lunch. Throughout my life, I have worked in almost every industry in the world - from an ice cream truck driver in Canada to a border patrol officer patrolling the border between Israel and Jordan. I worked at a criminal law firm that defended some of the most notorious murderers in Israel including Yigal Amir, the man who assassinated the Israeli Prime Minister Itzhak Rabin. Two years ago I started writing again and sold a couple of short stories that had been published online (Horrortree, Love letters to Poe). After that, I decided to write this book to try and convey my experiences with loss, grief, and PTSD. I currently live in the UK after having left Israel for a safer and more relaxed environment to raise my child.