For three and a half years, calamities hit Elizabeth Knox’s life in rapid succession.

Her sister suffered a psychotic break and was hospitalised against her will, her husband’s brother died by violence, and her mother was diagnosed with motor neurone disease.

A beloved storyteller and author of more than 14 novels including The Vintner’s Luck and The Absolute Book, Knox has given us many worlds. In her landmark memoir Night, Ma, she invites us into her own.

The result is a generous and transcendent reflection on time, illness and loss; about the daily work love and care require; and the net of family that people are held by, but also slip through.

She joins Emily Perkins to discuss it.