Caroline Barron’s father never found his birth mother. After he dies suddenly on her twentieth birthday, Caroline develops an insidious fear of her own untimely death. When she nearly bleeds out on an operating table during childbirth, it almost seems her greatest fear is justified. Emerging from the experience a changed woman, Caroline spends the next six years poring over her family history in an attempt to make sense of her inexplicable rage. The family secrets she unearths threaten to destabilise her identity and carefully built life, eventually leading her to New Zealand’s rugged Ripiro Beach, where past and present dramatically collide. Her brand new book, Ripiro Beach details her discovery that there are mental health issues, suicide and incarceration in her family and – most significantly – that she is Māori.

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The show is intended to provide encouragement for the listener but is for entertainment purposes only and NOT a substitute for proper treatment or to be used in any legal capacity whatsoever. Please seek help from a qualified mental health provider.