'Before the Fall' is a retelling of Henry James' 'The Golden Bowl', but with a twist as it involves the gay lovers, Marty Townsend and Carlton Aspern, seducing and manipulating the widowed Australian millionaire Clara de Veer and her daughter Maggie. The precious vase, with its almost invisible flaw, is the vehicle, which Clarke uses to extinguish the flame of trust that previously burnt in Maggie's heart: revealing past misdemeanours and the price one must paid for the sin of adultery — the surrendering of one's desires.