If you’ve ever been in a romantic relationship of any kind and you’ve been together a while, you will have probably encountered your partner’s mother.

The image we have of a mother-in-law is pretty grim, generally. They don’t get great press. But for many women, their relationship with their mother-in-law is one of the most fraught in their lives and there are good reasons for this! They are intimately connected to your partner and so are you, obviously, but to one another, you’re pretty much strangers.

Sally Hepworth noticed this when she started collecting stories for her latest novel, aptly called The Mother-In-Law. Women would tell her stories about their partners mothers bringing over a raw chicken after they’d just had a baby, or of mothers-in-law who have keys to their child's house and use them regularly. And so, her fifth novel was born.

Sally is one of Liane Moriarty’s favourite Australian authors - she’s written five books, she has 3 children and she’s spent a long time talking to people who had issues with their mothers-in-law.

So what is it about this relationship that makes it so high-drama?

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CREDITS:

Host: Mia Freedman

With thanks to special guest Sally Hepworth https://www.sallyhepworthauthor.com/

Buy her latest book The Mother In Law at any good bookstore now.

Producer: Elissa Ratliff

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