The Performance

Three women attend the performance of the play, Happy Days, by Samuel Beckett. Meanwhile bushfires rage in the state threatening lives and property.

Margot, an older lady, is a professor of literature. She lives with her husband whose health is failing and has outbursts which end with her covered in bruises. As the prospect of retirement approaches, Margot is concerned about her future.

Ivy attends the play with her lifelong friend, Hilary. Ivy is a philanthropist and is making a donation to the Theatre Company producing the play. But Ivy has had problems with relationships over the years and is concerned as to how to relate to her son and his family.

Summer is a drama student who works for the theatre company. Once the play begins she is allowed to watch the play. Summer is very concerned about the bushfires, especially as she knows that her partner will have attempted to drive to meets her parents who will be trying to escape the fire.

Throughout the book we have visions of what is happening on the stage as the play unfolds. However we are also shown how concerns about their own lives affect the viewing of the play by the women. At interval Ivy recognises Margot as she was once one of Margot's students and Margot, Ivy and Hilary attend the function organised in the break. Meanwhile Summer goes to the staff room to check her phone for phone calls about the fires and manages to make contact with Alice who is safe.

 By the end of the play the three women have a greater understanding of their lives beyond the theatre.

Happy Days By Samuel Beckett - Wikipedia

Pamela Rabe shines in this hypnotic revival of Samuel Beckett’s classic play Happy Days - The Conversation May 12 2025

Happy Days - SparkNotes 

On Not Climbing Mountains

An Australian woman travels to Switzerland to visit the country where her father, who has recently died, was born. She explores the country by train following suggestions from a copy of an old Baedeker guide and during her travels reflects on lives and works of a variety of authors, playwrights, actors, artists, explorers and others associated with Switzerland over the years. The daughter also remembers an exhibition that she once saw of a series of paintings by Jean-Frédéric Schnyder (JFS) of railway station waiting rooms  throughout Switzerland. She describes the paintings relevant to the railway stations as her journey progresses.

On Not Climbing Mountains by Clair Thomas does not really have a plot though the daughter's reminiscences develop into a pattern during the journey allowing the reader to gradually learn about the daughter's memories and relationship with her father. Once I became used to the style of the writing I enjoyed reading about the lives of  people involved with Switzerland in different ways as well as the experience and thoughts of the daughter as her journey progressed until she returned home.

Swiss Baedeker guides - Hidden Europe 

Art of Jean-Frédéric Schnyder (part VI Waiting Rooms for the Eyes) - On Schnyderian Art

 Jean-Frédéric Schnyder Waiting Room exhibition  - Mamco art exhibition

On Not Climbing Mountains - The Guardian 27 February 2026. 

The Beacon

Jack Harris, the son of a newspaper magnate, has been exiled to Byron Bay to work on the local newspaper, The Beacon. Shortly after his arrival Patrick O'Shaughnessy, the editor of the newspaper, disappears while surfing and first reports are that he was taken by a shark. The local police are prepared to believe this story but Jack becomes convinced that the shark attack was staged and he and Patrick's daughter, Caitlin, join forces to discover the truth.

Byron Bay has more than its fair share of anti-vaxers, opposers to 5G and other conspiracy theorists who had objected to articles opposing their views appearing in the local press. The main window of the newspaper office was regularly smashed with a brick. Caitlin was certain that her father was working on big story that would shock the local community. If they could find the files they may also find who had killed her father.

In The Beacon P. A. Thomas has written a fast moving, often humorous, crime novel involving  an array of often unusual characters. It soon becomes obvious that corruption abounding in the present and the past is the cause of the latest crime. Jack, Caitlin, Zoe and Ricky need to work quickly to solve the case before more innocent people become implicated.

The Sunbaker

When Nicola Fox visits her holiday house at Brunswick Heads she does not expect to find a dead body sunbaking near the pool. So begins this crime romp, The Sunbaker, written by P A Thomas. Nicola contacts a local journalist, Jack Harris, to help her. Police seem to think she is a suspect even though she has only just arrived at the house after driving from Newcastle where she works as a forensic pathologist.

Initially the local police investigate the murder but then an organised crime unit arrives from Sydney to take over the case. Suspicion soon arises among the locals that there is more to this case than first appears. Could there be a police cover-up and if so, why? Jack and Rick undertake their own investigation using methods not necessarily approved of by the authorities. They are assisted by Caitlin, a lawyer friend of Jack. 

P A Thomas has written an amusing crime novel with many twists and turns. Readers of the Stephanie Plum series by Janet Evanovich will enjoy reading this book.