Hello everyone!
With Outlander out and about (and did you SEE the new EW cover for the upcoming second season? I swooned, for real, it's not even funny!), the Scotland mania has certainly made its way around the globe, although I can't really remember how I got my hands on these particular books that I'm going to talk about. Or well, some of them at least, because from what I understand there will be twelve of them altogether, and I'm ... well, am I even halfway through? No not yet, I think I'm on number five at the moment, haven't started yet.
Basically, for whatever reason, I found myself a copy of Monica McCarty's books about warriors from the Highlands, who, as opposed to their 'civilized' Lowlands brethren, usually come in packages of big, built like the Hulk, and devilishly handsome.
I'm actually beginning to wonder just where on Earth these photographers who do the cover shoots find all these muscled men!
Anyway, I only later realized, when talking to my mother about this particular book, that they're being translated into Slovene, and we're obviously building that collection. But I don't exactly know what started me on this series, only that I did, and The Chief is the first of the books.
Like I said, this is a series with a great number of books, twelve main ones with a couple of novellas thrown in for good measure because, you know, you can't have too many Highland brutes running around! Although the general consensus from me thus far is that I never really liked all aspects to each given story (maybe it was the heroine, maybe the hero, maybe some action that happened which made me want to scream in frustration), bottom line is that I'm still reading.
That has to count for something, right?
So the premise of all these books is Scotland's fight for freedom during the time of Robert Bruce, and said Bruce decides he needs to amp it up and change his warfare tactics. He's been a knight and chivalrous to the core so far and he hasn't won yet, so he decides to enlist the help of Highlanders from the Western Isles - and train a group of elite warriors who will go on clandesdine operations for him, doing what seeminly can't be done and spreading havoc through the English and their supporters.
Sounds decidely Navy SEAL doesn't it?
It's what got me though, because it's progressive - and I mean, it COULD have worked. Why not?
So Bruce needs someone to bring all these 'I do things on my own' hulking men to heel, and who else to do it but the one man fabled to be the best warrior in all of the Highlands, if not Scotia herself? Tor MacLeod, Laird of the MacLeods of Skye, is going to answer the king's call.
Well, in theory.
Because when we meet Tor, he has problems of his own - namely, his twin brother has just abducted and run off with a woman that could start a war worthy of the Trojans, and he's pissed off. Now if you're like me, you're thinking 'I don't want to make the Hulk angry! He'll go SMASH!' You're right about that. But Tor also has a brain in that head of his, which makes him even deadlier, sadly.
Now, he's being summoned to a council, where he hopes to put all this to rest, but what he doesn't know is that Frasers are coming there as well (and no, no Jamie Fraser here, sadly), and the brute of a father who's been abusive to his daughters all their lives, wants one of them to marry Tor. Beatrice just wants to be a nun - he doesn't want to hear it. Her sister Christina thus vows she'll do anything to protect her.
Which results in a big, fat misunderstanding where she ends up in Tor's bed, and he unknowingly rapes her.
Yeah, good start to a marriage, right? Right.
They do get married, and he takes her back home to Skye where he begins training for the warriors who will make up the Highland Guard, though at the time he has no intentions of leading them. He just wants to do this and get them the heck away from his islands, which keep getting attacked while he's away. End result? A spy has to be somewhere. Even I figured that one out.
Back from Perdition (which is the name for the training the men are going through), Christina is nesting and trying to make this marriage work with a whole lot of romantical nonsense inside her head. I swear, I thought she had air in there sometimes. It's painfully obvious Tor really isn't an ideal husband (all other qualities aside) and he HATES surprises. That never stops her from trying to surprise him though, because ... well, he has to give in sometime, doesn't he?
Sigh.
Tor does eventually start falling in love, but the problem is that he feels he isn't allowed to, his job is to keep his clan safe, etc. etc. So he dedicates a lot of time to his clan and the men he's training, not so much to his wife.
Luckily, it all pays off because when the clan is once again attacked while he's with the others, the Highlanders raly after he rushes back to protect his people, refusing to let him stand alone and basically unleashing hell on the poor unsuspecting devils who were foolish enough to start the attack to begin with. Because one Hulk is enough of a problem, but these guys? There's like, at least ten of them at this point. You know no one stands a chance.
Unfortunately, what should have ended relatively well is moot point because Christina, overhearing something, unknowingly leads the traitor straight to the training men afterwards, which could be a disaster if news leaks that Bruce is training a secret guard. Obviously, her husband is NOT pleased, and the little lady decides this is the last straw, and that she's leaving him.
What happens is that she gets kidnapped by the English, Tor flies off the handle because, you know, he loves her and he's been an idiot, and he and the Guard go off to have fun attacking a fully garrisoned English outpost.
You know they love it.
The book ends with our main couple finally on the same page, and Robert Bruce is crowned by the Countess of Buchan rightful King of Scotland. He then gives each Highland Guard his own nom de guerre (war name), and Tor thus becomes 'Chief' since he decided to lead them after all.
And then the fun begins, because becoming part of the Highland Guard is only the beginning! Now it's time to free Scotland.
I will admit, I liked the military aspects of the ook much more than the romantic one, because the heroine got on my nerves with how unreasonable she was. Kind of like Felicity is being on Arrow right about now, actually. Christina had a set view of what her husband should be like (aka like Lancelot), and then when she DIDN'T get that, she went full pout mode. Tor, on the other hand, I felt almost sorry for, but he did make up for it with his fighting and leadership skills. Plus in one of the subsequent books he quips that he feels like a church bell when someone chucks a manacle at his helmet, so you have to love the guy.
However, heroine aside, I was curious about Operation Lion Rampart (let's not say how modern that sounds, but I swear, it's in the book) and so I read on! I encourage you to do the same as well if you fall in love with these Highlanders. Their women can be airheads, but at least they're worth reading about!
xx
*image not mine
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