“Great Day” opens early on the morning of Audley Tyler's seventy-second birthday, which is the same day as a national Australian holiday. Angie, Audley's daughter-in-law, sits gazing out to sea while, nearby, Audley is fishing. When Angie walks back to the house, she is greeted by her son, Ned, who informs her that Fran is coming with Audley's son, Clem, her ex-husband.

Angie is always “ill at ease” in the kitchen of her mother-in-law, Madge, where Angie sits drinking tea. Her daughter, Jenny, asks Angie whether Audley has caught any fish, and Ned asks why Fran and Clem are still friends after their divorce, but no one answers them. Ned agrees to go out and pick wild spinach with his sister for Madge's soup. The narrator notes that the daughters-in-law never really feel a part of the tightly knit Tyler clan.

Today, the entire family...