I keep thinking this series should have ended with "A Breath of Snow and Ashes", but I have to say that MOBY (as we fans call this novel) re-ignites the original spark of the Outlander series. There's a lot more history, up close and personal, as we follow the lives of Jamie and Claire Fraser and...
I love Diana Gabaldon's books. But I've learned that I love her books only when they include Jamie Fraser and Claire Beauchamp Fraser. So I tried the "Lord John" series, and stopped after the first title. But this one includes Jamie too, and as a main character, so we got along just fine. It's mi...
I began reading the series after season 1'of the Starz tv program ended and I wanted to know what happens. I was hooked from the beginning and can say became obsessed with reading. Although the books can be difficult to understand and follow due to the use of Gaelic and vocabulary appropriate for...
I was a drone. It was a slow start, admittedly- and I complained at first, but I soon forgot what I had to complain about, and now am just in awe. I finished it this morning. I literally jumped hearing 'The End'. I was not expecting that ending. I do hope that leaves room for maybe a little ...
Okay - the 4 stars are for my personal bias toward time travel books and the fact that I was totally taken along for the ride on these books. Yes, there's lots of violence (very descriptive violence, including domestic) and a good amount of sex (very descriptive, also) with good reason to questio...
Reviewed for THC ReviewsDragonfly in Amber is no ordinary romance novel. In fact, in spite of its romance and paranormal elements, it is far more of a historical novel than anything else in my opinion. This book basks the reader in lush descriptions of 18th century European history, from the poli...
I gave up on this book because I was sustaining permanent damage from reading it and I was afraid I'd start hitting back. And it's a borrowed copy, so that wouldn't be cool.In fairness, I should say there's a lot of good writing here. I really enjoyed the beginning chapters. They even kind of cra...
The first book had me completely absorbed in the little details and fascinating plot, the second book made me angry by the huge jump in time and then made me happy, while the third book continued to hold my interest. The fourth book was a little slow. The fifth book made me wish for all that time...
When we last saw Claire and Jaime and the gang, Claire had just finished telling her story about Jaime and Scotland to her daughter, Brianna, and a researcher, Roger. They decide to find out what happened to Jaime. Apparently, he did NOT die in the Battle of Culloden...but is he still alive in ...
And so concludes another installment of the madcap adventures of that time-traveling Highlander clan, the Mackenzie-Fraser whatevers. This was the least weird, but most melodramatic of the books so far. It was wacky and I enjoyed it, despite some issues.In 1767, Claire, Jamie and Ian are fresh fr...
Like many other "Outlander" fans, I've been reluctant to even attempt to read this second Gabaldon series which centers on a secondary gay character first introduced in "Dragonfly in Amber." I was discouraged not only by the average Goodreads rating of 3.35, but by the sheer memory of THE homosex...
I love Lord John Grey. I kind of want to be best friends with him. Or, at least take him out for drinks and commiserate about how he has absolute shit luck with romance. He seems okay with his life, but I just feel so bad for him, like, all the time.Lord John and the Brotherhood of the Blade is t...
Lord John and the Hands of Devils is a collection that contains three Lord John mysteries... one simply called a short story and the other two meriting the designation "novella" from the author. Prior to starting the Lord John novels, I should have done a bit of research, as the first of these s...
Author: Diana GabaldonGenre: Novella, Historical, MysteryRating: CIn "Lord John and the Hellfire Club" Lord John Grey (of the famed Outlander series) witnesses the murder of one Robert Gerald, the cousin of Grey’s friend and colleague, Harry Quarry. Even before rumours begin to circulate about G...
The fact that he was seeing Jamie Fraser’s face at all was evidence enough of that, never mind the look of the man. Jamie was standing by the armorer’s wagon, his arms full of the bits and pieces Armand had just given him, white as milk and swaying back and forth like a reed on Loch Awe. Ian reac...
The waning moon was low in the sky, but still shed light enough to see the brick path through the garden; the espaliered fruit trees spread black as spiderwebs against the walls. Someone had been digging; I could smell the cold damp of recently turned earth, and shivered involuntarily at the hint...
Hot pastry, steaming, juicy meat. There was a row of fat little pasties ranged along the sill, covered with a clean cloth in case of birds, but showing plump and rounded through it, the odd spot of gravy soaking through the napkin. His mouth watered so fiercely that his salivary glands ached and ...
But—surely that…” This made no sense. His voice trailed off, and he rallied, forcing his drifting thoughts back into coherence. “It is a Mr. Henry Washington. He is kin to the general, too?” “So far as I ken, anyone named Washington within three hundred miles is kin to the general.” Murray stoope...
To that point -- despite Quarry's loudly-expressed doubts beforehand -- it had been a house-party much like any other in Lord John's experience, though with more talk of politics and less of hunting than was customary. In spite of the talk and entertainment, though, there ...
If you go today to the battlefield at the Plains of Abraham (in spite of this poetic name, it really was just named for the farmer who owned the land, one Abraham Martin; I suppose “The Plains of Martin” just didn’t have the same ring to it), you’ll see a plaque at the foot of the cliff there, co...
She had seemed to recover after the first bad fever, and after a day spent regaining her strength, had insisted she was able to travel. They had got no more than a day’s ride north of Charleston, though, before the fever struck again. Brianna had hobbled the horses, and made a hasty camp near a s...
Paul Rakoczy, Comte St. Germain, picked up the vial, pulled the cork, and sniffed cautiously, for the third time, but then recorked it, still dissatisfied. Maybe. Maybe not. The scent of the dark-gray powder in the vial held the ghost of something familiar—but it had been thirty years. He sat for...
To be honest, once I started doing “bulges” (that is, shorter pieces of fiction) involving him, I just looked at which year it was and then consulted one of my historical timeline references to see what kinds of interesting events happened in that year. That’s how he happened to find himself in Q...
One such trail follows the story of Roger MacKenzie’s parents.In Outlander, we learn that Roger was orphaned during World War II, and then adopted by his great-uncle, the Reverend Reginald Wakefield, who tells Claire and Frank that Roger’s mother was killed in the Blitz, and that his father was a...