The Running Grave Initial Read-Through: Part 4; Spoilers for Chapters 1-41

More analysis in my slow and steady read through.  Spoilers in Blue. 

I must say, I was happy to finally get some good food in the form of the Victoria sponge cake at Garvestone. I'm going to add it to my Strike recipe collection. 

Are we supposed to wonder why Nicholas's arm is in a sling in the photo of Alexander Graves' 22nd? And even the Graves were initially taken in by Jonathan Wace? Remember Abigail's remark of Jonathan Wace having Phillipa eating out of his hand, and Nicholas seems in a hurry to hide that picture. 

Daiyu inherited a quarter-million fortune when her father committed suicide, as was also the heir to the estate. Important to remember, if she turns up alive. Something sister Philippa (who really doesn't want that death investigated) seems to be aware of, as well, given Phillipa's oldest child is now the estate heir. 

"And, after all," [Nicholas] said, "there's no bringing Daiyu back, is there?"

"On the contrary," said Strike. "My information is, the church brings her back regularly." 

Is it possible Daiyu will be found alive?  We are clearly supposed to think Phillipa had reason to want her dead. 

The letter-writing instructions also reflect techniques from Hassan's book on how cults preemptively prepare their recruits to resist their families' efforts to persuade them to leave. Ditto for the confessions in the "Revelations"-- which are also a huge element of Robert Jay Lifton's Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism, which I have read but not blogged about yet. 

I'll close here with Robin's third communication to her team.  

Names

Kurt: (Updated) Kurt Jordan Reaney is far from courteous during his phone call to Strike. 

Kyle: "Strait, narrow." 

Nicholas: "Victory of the People."

Barbara: "foreign, strange" 

Phillipa: "Lover of horses" This certainly fits the one who spent her inheritance on a prize horse and whose silver-framed picture of her riding "Bugle Boy" is proudly displayed in the home. 

Edward: "Wealthy guard." Certainly he is protective of the family fortune, which is probably why the Graves are so much better off than the Chiswells. This is the second Edward in the book, the other being the injured Edward Edensor.

Archie: from Archibald: "true and bold"  Interestingly, Nicholas calls his father-in-law this.  Could Archibald be a middle name?  The Colonel gave his name as Edward when he called Pat to arrange the interview.

O'Connor:  "Lover of hounds."  Sounds like he would have been a good match for Phillippa, the fox-hunting lover of horses. 

Carine: "beloved, pure, friend, face" 

Makepeace: "Mediator, one who makes peace." 

Delaunay: "dwells near the alder-tree"  This name has potential. Though an alder tree is different from an elder tree (see here for a bit about their wandlore) no Harry Potter reader could fail to note the similarity in the names, and both woods are associated with magical journeying to the underworld. 

Jacob: "Supplanter" A variant of James. 

Maureen: "Star of the sea;" a version of Marion, same name as the Wace-enthralled widow in Robin's recruitment group. 

Agnes: "pure, holy." 

Isaac: "laughter"

Mills: "lives near a mill"

Curtis: "Courteous, polite"  a variation of Kurt. Could this be a connection, romantic or otherwise, between Kurt Jordan Reaney and Cherie Gittins. They were punished together, could they have fled together?  Could Cherie be the mysterious unnamed sister who visited him in prison, having chosen Jordan's real first name as her last, when she needed a new one?

Timeline

Strike muses that Switch was barely a year old when Leda died. This is inconsistent with past statements. Leda was supposed to be six months pregnant at Strike's 18th birthday, in November 1992, and to give birth to little SLBW in December 1992. The 18th party was during Strike's final year of secondary school, given that Nick and Ilsa met there, dated for a year, then broke up to attend separate colleges. Strike would have begun Oxford in September 1993. Leda died mid-way through his second year, when Strike was 20, so late 1994. Switch would have just turned two, not one.  

Daiyu was born in May 1988, making her conception date August 1987, so near the latter part of my original estimated range. This rules out her Mazu being impregnated by the Crowthers and confirms that, though she was young, she was past the age of consent when Alexander Graves began his affair with her. It also puts her Daiyu's birth during the same month that Jennifer Wace drowned. Daiyu would be about 28, if alive. 

The Graves confirm that 14-year old Anna, Mazu's mother and presumed Crowther victim who left the church after giving birth dies of an overdose after working as a prostitute. 

Harry Potter Echoes

The mock baptism during which Robin officially joins the UHC evokes both the Black Mass that resurrects Voldemort and the mock-baptismal scene in the Forest of Dean. 

We have a connection with Philippa Delaunay's name to the alder tree, which, though different from, sounds like elder tree. Given Phillipa's jealousy of Daiyu, and the threat her niece posed to her children's inheritance, and the fact that Daiyu has connections to two powers of the Deathly Hallows (invisibility and returning from the dead), we need to be alert to a possible connection here. 

Ring Composition

Papa J's speech in Chapter 34 is a lot like Jimmy Knight's in Lethal White. 

We are getting a lot of Chiswell echoes in Garveston:  Big manor house (albeit in better repair), horsey woman, fat Labrador, older brother whose criminal behavior was dismissed as "naughtiness" and whose family pulled strings to get him a light sentence. The patriarch clearly believes the family home should pass only to male heirs. The Colonel even says "marijuana" oddly, like Izzy does. 

Alexander Graves was diagnosed with "manic-depression," now called bipolar disorder, which is also what CC's Lula Landry had. We've also got a supposed suicide, and a hostile sibling.  Could we have another link here? 

Minor connection to CoE: Phillipa Graves is called Pips; the former Philip Midgley choose the new name Pippa after her transition. 

Colonel Graves hired O'Connor to dig up dirt to blackmail Jonathan and Mazu, similiar to Jasper's wish to blackmail Winn and Knight in LW. We also have Aunt Phillipa really not wanting her niece's death investigated, just like Uncle Tony Landry in CC. 

Literary Alchemy

Robin's crawling around in the mud and having to fake a fall in the chicken coop is very nigredo, while of course the mock baptism is an albedo element.