Note: The books in the Enlightenment trilogy build on each other. To understand the relationship between the principals and to avoid spoilers in this review, you should read Provoked and Beguiled first. Enlightened is the last book in the Enlightenment trilogy and the strongest. Unlike the previous novels wherein David Lauriston struggled to accept his…
Miss Anwen Windham is on the board of directors of the House for Wayward Urchins, a school and home for orphaned boys which provides them with shelter and a decent education. Anwen worries for and loves all of the boys in her charge very much, but there are grey clouds on the horizon. Struggling with…
The Highland Commander finds its inspiration in real life events surrounding the Jacobite uprisings of the early 1700s. I’ll admit that my knowledge of 18th Century Scottish politics is sadly lacking; however I know enough to understand the danger behind a Scotsman discussing the cause during this period. Lord Aiden Murray and his fellow officers…
Code Name: Verity is one of the most memorable YA novels I have ever read. A breathtaking story about a young Scottish woman taken prisoner for being a spy in Nazi Germany, it was heart wrenching, enlightening, beautiful, and lyrical. The Pearl Thief is the prequel to that tale, a look at Julia before she…
Suzanne Enoch has a long line of successful Scottish romances behind her, and this book is a delightful addition to her long backlist. She takes us back to the highlands in her latest set of Scottish-set romances, No Ordinary Hero, the first of which, Hero in the Highlands, features career soldier Gabriel Forrester and land…
Lillian “Lily” Hargrove agreed to pose naked for a painter she loved. When he betrays her by winning a contest with the private work, she is both brokenhearted and ruined. Lily’s absentee guardian, Alec Stuart, Duke of Warnick, comes to save her by marrying her off to anybody but him. Putting a catastrophic bad choice in the…
This début novel features a time-slip plot moving back and forth between events in 1910 and 2010 on a remote island in Scotland’s Outer Hebrides. The descriptions of the setting are vivid and evoke an almost gothic feel. While much of the language is beautiful, the descriptive passages overwhelm the characters and plot, and left…
Liam MacKenzie, Lord Ravencroft, is a man of action. When we first meet him, he’s pulling the rotting skeleton of a bawdy woman he once knew out of a bog, a woman the local gossip accuses him of murdering. He has, in response to his father’s cruel teachings, become a soldier for the crown and…
I’m always up for a good fairy-story retelling, and having heard good things about this author, I picked up Beauty and the Highland Beast with reasonably high expectations. I can’t, however, say that they were met, because while the writing is very good and the tension that leads to the dramatic finale is skilfully built,…
It’s official. I’ve stumbled into the latest thriller trend – unreliable narrators. In fact, I just about fell into The Ice Twins, even though I wasn’t crazy about the premise at first. A twin dies in a tragic fall, and only later does her mother realize she may have buried the wrong sibling. Haven’t we…