“The Highland Game Is Afoot”: A Review of Secrets Taken to the Grave (The Strathbairn Trilogy, Book 2) by Isobel Blackthorn

 

 (Next Chapter, 2025). ISBN: 979-8272238542

A few months ago, I reviewed the first book in this trilogy, What Happened at the Abbey, which I enjoyed for its vivid locales, Gothic tropes, and interesting characters.  Having received the complete trilogy in a single volume, I knew that the story’s heroine, Ingrid Barker—the self-styled widow of Winchester—would return to the formidable, Usheresque mansion in Straithbairn, in the Highlands of Scotland, although I had no clue as to how or why. Her time with the owners, the McCleods, for whom she served as housekeeper in What Happened at the Abbey, was anything but pleasant, and she left under multilayered, malignant circumstances.

Book two opens with the return of Ingrid and her precocious preteen daughter for the funeral of the McCleod patriarch, which launches a set of mystery boxes into motion. Ingrid, being a fan of Sherlock Holmes (Secrets… takes place in 1893; Sir Arthur Conan Doyle has just killed off the world’s only consulting detective at Reichenbach Falls) and seeking ways to occupy her time when she is unexpectedly delayed from departing Straithbairn (due to weather and other, unforeseen circumstances), endeavors to unravel the mysteries of the McCleods and the village, in addition to her own. While doing so, she navigates the police, who are in the midst of an investigation related to events in book one, as well as the boundary-challenged McCleods.

The feuding siblings of the family McCleod, with whom Ingrid is staying, ratchet up their infighting after their father’s will is read. These three siblings, two brothers and a sister, are trying to get on with their lives despite their personal failings and the crushing weight of generations-old secrets, traumas, betrayals, shifting alliances, resentments, dark defilements, and a buried case of nepoticide that have laid an Usher-like curse upon the house and land; none of them are succeeding. Not that they have much of a chance when their dead, despicable patriarchs stare down at them from portraits hung throughout the house, which further suffers from their oppressive presence through books, family heirlooms, and other physical matter they’ve left behind as pointed reminders of their dark, despicable deeds.

Using uncovered letters, ledgers, diaries, and other documentation (some discovered with the assistance of an intrusive, insistent ghost), Ingrid attempts to piece together the McCleod family history, navigate the dislike of their tragic neighbors, and secure a future for herself and her daughter in daunting, near-dire circumstances. Along the way, we learn the McCleod family history and genealogy, which I enjoyed mapping out.

Although there is also a haunting in What Happened at the Abbey, I found the one in Secrets Taken to the Grave to be edgier and a touch more atmospheric, reminiscent of Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting. This increased intensity is appropriate to both the particular ghost and the circumstances of the second book rather than a comparative comment on Blackthorn’s writing.

A word about Ingrid. She’s given to self-doubt and vacillation throughout the first two books, although she’s never reduced to the trope of the helpless damsel in distress so prevalent in classic Gothic literature. She never trusts a man enough to given him her heart, which serves both she and the story well.  

As I mentioned in my review of What Happened at the Abbey, this trilogy will appeal to fans of Downton Abbey, Hound of the Baskervilles, The Master of Ballantrae, and a hundred (or thousand) other Gothic and mystery tales (some of which I’ve mentioned in these reviews). The author gives us plenty of authentic Dickensian detail about clothing, furniture, food, and the books and music of the time to ensure our deep immersion—one of the joys of the Gothic genre (and Victorian/Edwardian literature in general) for me. A highlight was the mention of James Malcom Rymer’s String of Pearls, which is the original Sweeney Todd/Mrs. Lovett story, published in 1847, the same year Rymer coauthored one of the seminal tales of its type, Varney the Vampire.

Although it’s best to read the entire series, Blackthorn does an excellent job of providing callbacks to book one for readers who may be unfamiliar with it (or who have forgotten what they previously read). It is important to mention that the frequent callbacks never slow the narrative down.

As with What Happened at the Abbey, Secrets Taken to the Grave concludes with Ingrid’s departure.

Although there is a clue as to why she might return, the larger circumstances of what will unfold in book three are something I look forward to discovering.