Eight Stories

(Available as E-Book or Paperback or Audio)

The compelling, dramatic series of white-knuckle encounters with a medley of wild animals keeps you turning the pages, feverish to know how Myfanwy manages to escape alive. A risk taker, she likes living life on the edge and in this adventure-packed memoir, you’ll discover how in the remote forests, deserts, and oceans of Australia, she sidestepped death not once but multiple times. If you fear snakes, spiders, sharks or dogs, this book is for you.

These stories span her childhood to adult encounters. They include incidents while traveling with her family to remote locations in Australia, to close calls with wild animals during biological fieldwork in Kakadu National Park in the Northern Territory. Other incidents happened while surfing and riding her beloved horse.

Myfanwy’s curiosity and depth of understanding the behaviour of animals, is reflected in the way she describes these contacts with wild animals. Her stories interweave a love of animals and nature, with adrenalin and adventure.

Reviews

Maria said of Cujo- the Attack “I could picture it as if I was there”.
John said of El Toro – “Very clever and brave – El bloody Toro made me laugh aloud. What amazing bush experiences of wildness you have had – so exceedingly rare – I am jealous. I also learnt that you need agility to catch Rock Possums, so that’s one career lost to me.”
Ben – “Great stories about spideys, I love them myself!”
Bronwyn said of Eaten Alive- “Fantastic story!”
Angela said of Eaten Alive – “Oh wow a compelling story! Interesting behaviours demonstrated in the part of both fish and human!”

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More Reviews

Helen Menzies

5.0 out of 5 stars Journeys with Myf

Reviewed in Australia 🇦🇺 on 17 October 2021

“It seems to happen in my life that I set out for an adventure and it’s dramatically rearranged by the gods into one of those deep priceless experiences.”
So says Dr Myf Webb in Life Death Encounters, and it’s no exaggeration. The book is a stirring tale of derring-do, told in an authentic down-to-earth no-fuss Australian voice.
“I … reflected on how I had somehow survived three direct active threats on my life by three very different types of animal, a Great White Shark, an Eastern Brown Snake and now a wild buffalo bull.”
To that list of adventures the spellbound reader can add spiders, wild horses, wild donkeys, beached whales, the hunt for secretive possums as part of her doctorate work, and being thrown from her horse when it was attacked by a bull-Arab hunting dog intent on murder.
Phew.
Most of these stories were written by Mfy Webb during her year-long treatment for cancer. In a lifetime of challenges this was yet another to overcome. The details of that adventure are yet to be published, but readers of Life Death Encounters will know to anticipate another inspiring journey of curiosity and courage.

cristobel

4.0 out of 5 stars A wild ride

Reviewed in Australia 🇦🇺 on 18 October 2021

It’s not often I find myself holding my breath as I read a book, however in the opening story of Wild: Life death encounters with wild animals, I was doing exactly that.

The shark encounter at Murramarang Beach raised those old fears which were embedded into everyone who watched the 1975 classic, Jaws. I watched that film as a child and was terrified for some time of the overcast days at the beach, when you couldn’t see what was under the surface. Even though I know Dr Myfawney Webb, and am familiar with many of her stories of an adventurous life, I was still riveted to the pages of my kindle as I followed her narrative of the shark encounter.

Myfawney has a knack for bringing you into her experiences, through the truth of the tales within this book and the authenticity of her voice.

It’s a real talent to be able to convey emotions such as desperation, fear, sadness and terror while staying true and real to her story.

Dr Webb has achieved this, and it was a real joy to see her stories brought to life with such passion.

I can highly recommend this book to any lovers of adventure, wildlife, Australian experiences and those who like to read a book perched on the edge of their seat.

menace aforethought

5.0 out of 5 stars Wild by Nature

Reviewed in Australia 🇦🇺 on 3 October 2021

It’s wonderful to see these works collected into a book. These are stories not just of the wild, but of the inner being, how we tread our path through the world, how we learn about ourselves and how to become a fully engaged person through challenges that we sometimes seek and which are sometimes thrown at us by life.
The stories not only surprise with the breadth of Myf’s experience from her work as a mammal specialist, travelling and living in remote Australia, but also in her love of animals and the wilderness in general. She takes on an immersing ride surfing, fascinated by a shark attack until the reality of the risk finally hits home. ‘This is the first time in my life I have completely and absolutely maxed out on exerting my body physically.’ We are there with her, feeling that intense moment, the stress of trying to get back to shore when there are no waves to help and splashing could be the worst possible idea! Fortunately, this is followed by ‘White and pure EUPHORIA’, and she is safe on the shore. But danger was never far behind her in the bush while she studied mammals, or even when she was young, and being confronted with angry brown snakes as well as death adders, yet that didn’t seem to faze her. Although she has learnt to respect the angry brown snake a little more over time. I remember going out with her and her reptile specialist husband, Johnno, on one of his field trips to collect death adders near Darwin. My partner John and I were in the back of the ute as he drove along a road between rice fields where he would jump out from time to time and bag one, only to toss it in the back with us! One thing I learned from our early time living in the upstairs flat from them in Glebe, where they were breeding Funnel web spiders to feed his study animals – death adders – life was never dull around Myf! A photo of her in the book, smiling while a python winds itself around her neck is a classic!
Whale rescues and her surprise at the bond she formed with one, her hundreds of efforts trying to trap wild Rock-ringtail possums in Kakadu, and I know she had to wear beekeepers kit at least at times to protect her from swarms of killer mosquitos, lost in the Kimberly among ‘dodgy mineshafts’ with a ‘team of blokes’, ‘waking up in the morning, la de la de la, walking down the sandy creek bed,’ and being confronted by a wild buffalo, one of the most dangerous animals you can encounter in the bush, the scientist in her even taking in that he pawed the ground with his left foot, so perhaps one part of the 7% of ‘left-handed’ creatures! How she escaped this situation is classic. She came off less well when her horse she was riding was attacked by a dog, ending in a 15-kilometre trek with a broken arm and a one-handed drive to hospital!
“But I don’t want to go among mad people,” Alice remarked.
“Oh, you can’t help that,” said the Cat: “we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.”
This quote from Alice in Wonderland seems particularly apt when I think of how Myf has crashed her way through life to contribute enormously to our understanding of the natural world, and perhaps this is how people have to be to do this work. So, it is not surprising that she has fought cancer with the same chutzpah, and now has given the world a wonderful collection of stories from her adventures to inspire new generations to get out there and go for it

5.0 out of 5 stars Great read!

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on 14 June 2022

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Loved this quick read. Interesting

Beverley Runcie

As an animal behaviourist, Myfanwy has spent much of her time in rural Australia and shares with us some of her adventures.

I admire Myfanwy who has come across unexpected and dangerous situations with our wildlife, and remaining calm, she has been able to react with quick thinking, courage and determination.

These stories should inspire urban dwellers that much can be gained by stepping outside their cosy world.