How much do we really know about what happens to us under anaesthetic on the operating table? Can we hear what’s going on around us? Is pain still pain if we are not awake to feel it? Anaesthesia is Kate Cole-Adams’ riveting examination of these questions – a lyrical, sometimes shattering book that’s been hailed by Helen Garner as “a work of splendid richness and depth”. Kate speaks to ABC RN’s Natasha Mitchell about what goes on when we go under.