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Canongate acquires 'stunning' memoir by Holly Dawson
Canongate has acquired All of Us Atoms, a memoir by Holly Dawson, reader in residence at Charleston Trust. Canongate CEO Jamie Byng acquired world rights directly from the author. The book will be edited by senior commissioning editor Helena Gonda and is set to publish in hardback and e-book in May 2025.
The memoir is a collection of pieces following Holly’s experiences after being diagnosed with epilepsy, and a brain tumour—which she had to wait four months to find out was benign. Faced with the prospect of losing her memory, Holly revisits the moments that changed her–from childhood to motherhood, loss and ill health. It is told through shifting pronouns and perspectives, moving across place and time.
Through the pieces, a conversation emerges between her collection of selves: the Sister, the Dancer, the Gardener, the Mother, the Girl-Who-Read-Woolf.
Dawson said: "I’m thrilled to be working with Canongate. When I first spoke to Jamie, I wasn’t sure what it was—a collection of pieces, not quite essays, not quite short stories, playing in the memoir space to fuse memory and mythology, imagination and fact, and life both lived and unlived.
"When I started writing it, we’d just come out of lockdown, I was a single mum with two young children, I became really ill and started having seizures. I was diagnosed with epilepsy, but also with a brain tumour, which I had to wait four months to find out was benign–four months of grappling with my mortality, and with a memory that was beginning to fail. I realised my biggest fear wasn’t death but memory loss, and it became super urgent to get everything down.
"I’m so grateful to the whole Canongate family for embracing the playful ambiguity of the book, and for sharing my belief that we all need to find ways to make sense and meaning out of this bewildering, messy world."
Byng said: "From the moment I first heard Holly Dawson introduce an event at Charleston, a stunning event involving Tobias Menzies and Helena Bonham Carter that Holly had created and produced, I knew she was a smart and brilliant communicator. What I didn’t know was how gifted a writer Holly was or that we would be lucky enough to become her publisher.
"All of Us Atoms is an exceptional debut–structurally bold, linguistically limpid and emotionally devastating, and I cannot wait for us to start sharing this dazzling book with the world.”
Gonda said: "Holly is such a gifted writer and it’s been a privilege to work with her on this brave and beautiful memoir. All of Us Atoms captures the moments of becoming that form a life, and offers an urgent and profound excavation of the self. I can’t wait for readers to experience it next year."
