By Phil Jarratt
Although his first novel is, on the face of it, a tragi-comic ramble through the mores of trendy modern Sydney where everyone has too much of everything, former celebrity chef Peter Howard is also using his writing skills to exorcise demons that have plagued his real life.
A sometime Noosa resident and darling of the food festival scene, the flamboyant 75-year-old has many friends and former colleagues here, but I wonder how many will have known about the real-life hell that informs Maestro Of Madness, his fictional tale of businessman Eddie Philipson whose personal and professional life crashes all around him as he battles post traumatic stress disorder, brought on in middle age by sexual abuse suffered as a child.
Howard’s own PTSD was diagnosed in 1998, 30 years after a traumatic tour of duty in Vietnam.
He wrote in 2018: “I did not know I had PTSD until it was diagnosed and I started the long road to partial recovery. I soon learnt that there were plenty of ways by which I could be helped to face up to what I learnt is a mental illness – a term I have come to accept.”
As Howard freely admits, part of the problem was differentiating between his disease and the frequently excessive lifestyle of a super chef.
“The symptoms of PTSD can be confused with what we recognise as everyday parts of the cooking business – such as hitting the booze too much, drug abuse, mood swings and negative reactions to stress and tension, so I did not recognise it as PTSD.
Certainly, I was always drinking way too much alcohol, I was always overreacting to stress (my nickname was Peter Panic) and my mood swings made me not nice to be around.”
Like his anti-hero Eddie in the novel, Peter Howard has had many ups and downs in his long struggle with PTSD, but that hasn’t stopped him having a storied career as a TV chef for two decades, producing many fine cookbooks and delighting audiences at demonstrations, workshops and festivals.
In 2018 he was awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia for his culinary tourism work.
These days, while he still has a passion for cooking and eating fine food, he enjoys a quieter life on Brisbane’s bayside, where he is focusing on his writing.
If fiction is to be his future, Peter is off to a good start with Maestro Of Madness, which could have done with a judicious edit, but is a rattling good yarn nonetheless.
My only query is why he chose to set the novel in the baffling professional world of recruitment agencies when the bitchy kitchens of high-end restaurants might have offered more spice.
Maybe that will be our literary treat next time.
Peter Howard will be signing books and chatting at Annie’s Books on Peregian this Saturday 2 April between 10am and noon.
