Book Fourteen: Outlander

Book Fourteen: Outlander
Pages: 627
Finished: February 6

While on a second honeymoon in Scotland following the end of World War II, Claire Beauchamp, an army nurse, takes a walk through the wilderness, finds a standing stone circle (think Stonehenge), and magically travels back in time 200 years. While stuck in the past, she falls in love with a young Highland warrior, and adventure ensues. This is a well written book, if a bit wordier than I would have liked. The historical accuracy is, as far as I can tell, pretty spot on. I did really enjoy the storyline. It was definitely in some ways a very stereotypical romance novel: the hero does have a delightful habit of showing up to save the day at the last possible moment, and without difficulty; the heroine is capable of saving many deathly illnesses without the modern conveniences of medicine or technology; and I can’t imagine that her more modern speech patterns (and Army nurse cursing) would be accepted quite that easily as they seem to be.
Claire’s husband, Frank, is also in Scotland to research his genealogical heritage, rooted in the area, and including a young Army Colonel named Jonathan Randall. Claire’s uncle, who raised her, was an anthropologist, which you think would make her ore interested in her husband’s scholarly work, but Claire instead decides to spend her time wandering over hill and dell looking at plants. In retrospect, when Colonel Randall becomes the main villain of the book, you curse Claire for her inattention to details that might have helped her out. What time she and Frank don’t spend talking about his ancestors, or quaint Scottish tradition, is spent in bed, reacquainting themselves with one another. This portion of the book seemed, when I was reading it, to take up quite a bit of the first section of the book, but upon re-examination, it turns out to only be about 30 pages before she travels back in time.
Claire spends much of the first few months in the past trying to get back to the stone circle that magically transported her, but when she is finally taken there, she suffers a few hours of internal struggle that seemed much less of a struggle than I anticipated (a few hours of soulfully staring at the rocks), and decides to stay in 18th century Scotland with her young Scottish hottie rather than return to her scholarly and loving husband.
I don’t know that I agree with Claire’s choice. Perhaps I have never been in this kind of love. Perhaps I couldn’t truly visualize how attractive and loving Jamie Fraser was. Maybe my imagination ran wild with the lack of proper sanitation and the violent tendencies of the people. Maybe the danger and romance of the situation made it more likely that Claire would choose to stay. I just don’t know that I would make the same choice, and that makes me less likely to appreciate the book as much as I wanted to.
All that aside, it was a well-written book. The description of the locations, characters, and action, as well as the character development was everything a girl could hope for in a time-travel romance novel. I enjoyed it, and might even read the sequel; even though it looks to be just as long, and I’m not really sure I’m ready for that yet.

Good Reading,
Caitlin