[1] It is the third in his series featuring John Appleby, a young Detective Inspector in the Metropolitan Police.

The title refers to the Lament for the Makaris by the Scottish poet William Dunbar, which is constantly recited by one of the characters.

[2] The novel features a string of first person narratives of the events that takes place, which each character drawing a conclusion that builds on and also corrects the previous writer.

In the Highlands of Scotland around the ancient but lonely Erchany Castle, strange happenings have occurred which alarm the local inhabitants culminating in the death by falling off the tower by the castle's miserly, reclusive owner.

The arrival of an Edinburgh lawyer and a Scotland Yard man both throw doubt on this easy solution, as the case seems to have its roots in events that took place in Australia forty years before involving the dead man's brother.