A startling, delight-filled tour of graveyards and the people who love them, dazzlingly told.' - Denise Mina All of these sorrowful mysteries - and many more - are answered in A Tomb With A View, a book for anyone who has ever wandered through a field of crooked headstones and wondered about the lives and deaths of those who lie beneath.

Bod thought for a moment. ‘The living,’ he said. ‘Er. The dead.’ He stopped. Then, ‘… Cats?’ he offered, uncertainly.” ― Neil Gaiman, The Graveyard Book You really believe their relationship and feel their fear and confusion at being thrust into the heart of Mansion House, home of the Tomb Family. Ross’s journey takes him to all manner of places, but perhaps the one that speaks to us today is the most contemporary. Sharpham Meadow is a natural burial ground by Totnes in Devon. A secular place, with slate stones for markers, it is a place of calm and beauty where the bodies of those gone are put into the earth to become part of it. Bridget has buried Wayne there and often visits to chat to him. Ross’s conversation with Wyne’s funeral arrangers is fascinating. The Green Funeral Company offers an alternative path to the traditional funeral directors; one that urges creativity and is elemental in approach. It spoke to me of a way of doing things that felt less rigid and pompous and was for the living as much as the dead.

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I really enjoyed the set. Designed, built, and dressed by Bill Hemsley, Paul Melling, Roger Goodwin, Julie Holmes & Stuart Woodward, a library, with chairs, tables and bookcases, the slightly aged look and the dingy lighting all added to the ambiance. The set had plenty of dressing, the picture of Old Septimus, family pictures, plants, the secret passage, the drinks cabinet all worked together well. I personally would have removed the chair stage left, it would have given you more room to use the door and the drinks cabinet, plus offering more down stage space. The play is set in the library of a sinister old house, where a dusty lawyer reads a multimillion pound will to an equally sinister family. One has werewolf tendencies, another thinks he’s Julius Caesar, and a third buries more than seeds in her flower beds. With the addition of a sympathetic nurse and an author of romantic novels, who will be the last man (or woman) standing? Peter Ross spent some considerable time travelling across Britain and Ireland wandering round graveyards, talking to those who visit them, those who work in them, going on tours and gathering stories as he went. In modern Britain, however, fewer people are choosing to be buried in a graveyard: three quarters opt for cremation. Visiting and tending graves of relatives is also becoming less common, though strangely tombstone tourism is booming; Highgate cemetery is soon to have a cafe. In Brompton cemetery, Ross joins the Queerly Departed tour around plots of those thought to have been gay, lesbian, bisexual “or some shade between”. They pay their respects at the grave of the bohemian Italian heiress and bisexual, Marchesa Luisa Casati, who died in 1957 aged 76, and was buried with her taxidermied Pekinese: “She elevated hedonism to the level of poetry, putting the cadence into decadence, the verse into perverse.” As a child, we would take a shortcut to the shops via the churchyard and I was always told in no uncertain terms not to tread on the graves. I would look at the names, and wonder if those beneath would think kindly or come to find me!

Ward’s direction embraces the excesses of the plot rather than shying away from them, which is surely the way to go. There is the odd fluff and imprecision, and some of the pacing – particularly early on – is suspect, but overall there is a clever momentum to the production. The last act, when the constant series of murders has made the stage considerably less crowded, is particularly well done. An entertaining murder mystery play ‘A Tomb With A View’ by Norman Robbins was performed by Saxilby Drama Circle at Saxilby Village Hall. I thoroughly enjoyed the show, which had an intricate plot, many red herrings, and plot twists, along with crazy characters and a spooky house, this cheerfully ludicrous play was staged with considerable craft. Directors Pam Burnett and Mark Stoneham have considered this play and updated it somewhat. A startling, delight-filled tour of graveyards and the people who love them, dazzlingly told.’– Denise Mina A strange choice of play maybe, but overall this was yet another successful production for the Compton Players. Ross introduces us to characters like Lilias Adie, occupant of the only known witch grave in Scotland, who perished in 1704 after confessing - possibly after being tortured - to sorcery. She was buried beyond the tideline in Fife, and Ross tells her story simply and well.Not everything convinces, and some of the script is showing its age a little. But as a piece of nonsensical escapism, this more than passes muster.