Knowing how to fall is much more valuable than knowing how to walk.

When Tito was born, I was writing my fifth novel. That was how I saw my future: living in Venice and jumping from novel to novel. Tito’s birth changed all that.

Caught between life and death, I clung to life.

My words to Anna, as we stood contemplating the Scuola Grande di San Marco, moments before entering Venice Hospital, came true: ‘With a façade like that, I could even accept having a deformed child.’ I...