Hello everyone!
After the mini-break this Tuesday (because I spent most of the day with my family just enjoying myself, really), I'm BACK with another blog post!
And of course I'm back with a Diana Gabaldon book.
Novella, actually.
Honestly, I've been going through her Seven Stones to Stand or Fall collection and enjoying the heck out of it, which is probably why I don't mind talking about the individual stories from there really.
It's just one of those books you sort of have to take a look at when you can.
Even though it doesn't really feature our favourite Frasers, it DOES bring us a plethora of other supporting characters, not to mention we get to check in with some who we haven't seen since who knows which main book.
Besides, it's good to just immerse yourself in a different story every once in a while, after all.
So without further ado, let's jump right into it, and see what it is that A Fugitive Green has in store for us, shall we?
You'll find links to previous Gabaldon recaps and reviews at the bottom of this page.
A Fugitive Green actually takes place at the same time as Dragonfly in Amber, during which Claire and Jamie are in Paris, France, trying desperately to prevent and stop the Jacobite Rebellion which will lead to the slaughter of clans at Culloden Field.
At this time, Jamie pops into an interesting little store where he takes some sort of ... big bug ... so that his 'particular friend' can gift it to his mistress.
He also makes an impression on a seventeen-year-old shop owner's daughter, Minnie, whom you MAY recall from other books.
This is the story of how the future Duchess of Pardloe became the Duchess - and it's a fun one.
Minnie is in the intelligence business with her father, and they supply information to the people asking for it, or extract information, depending on who's asking and how they're asking. Minnie's actually really proficient in it, so her dad isn't often worried about her, but he DOES worry because she seems to have a fascination with James Fraser.
I ask you, who doesn't?
So his solution is to send his daughter to England, there to meet with several people on the list he gives her, but what he doesn't tell her is that he's actually sent her up there to procure a wealthy English husband.
Strike one for padre over there.
Minnie is more than capable of holding her own, however, and strikes out herself since she's been searching for her biological mother for a while now, and managed to track her down. However, the sight waiting for her isn't even remotely close to the one that she'd been expecting, because she finds her mother living in a world entirely of her own making, her senses mostly gone. Her aunt, her point of contact, explains that she had been a young nun, falling pregnant, and after getting kicked out of the convent and giving birth, the shock had been too much for her, so Minnie's father (who'd been arrested and exiled for it) made sure that her sister got her a nice place and still sends money for her upkeep.
With that mission down, Minnie then continues with the one her father had given her, and of course as luck would have it she runs exactly into the erstwhile Duke of Pardloe, who hasn't actually assumed the title because of family scandal.
He's also dealing with a scandal of his own, because he'd discovered his wife was having an affair and ended up killing the other guy in a duel, but his wife also died, her unborn baby with her, probably from the shock of it, so he's still recovering when the dead man's older brother starts scheming against him.
See, John's older brother Hal is attempting to rebuild his father's regiment after it had been disbanded when his dad took his own life (this scandal and the lies surrounding it are all explained in a Lord John Grey story), but for that he needs the support of his superiors.
And it's a bit bad that one of the influential people who could help him is the brother of the man he killed, so he's now trying to mess with him any way he can.
Minnie enters the equation completely by accident because one of her sources is actually from that family with a grudge against the Greys, and she feels sorry for Hal so she helps him when he has an anxiety attack. Or, pure panic attack really, let's put it that way.
Of course it wouldn't be a complication if Minnie wouldn't be asked from both interested parties to do something about the other - on the one hand, to discover if anyone else knew about the affair Hal's wife was having so they can prove it without exposing the rather private letters she'd written, and on the other to grab those letters so that Hal has no ammunition left.
In the end, she gets those letters, reads them, and decides Hal's wife was one of those women who never have enough attention, and she only started the whole affair business to make her husband jealous and get him to spend more time with her, when he was already devoted to her from head to toe.
So she goes to return said letters, ends up getting found by Hal (his reaction, when he sees her, is PRICELESS, given that he kind of just asks her what she's doing), and THEN ends up on the hearthrug with him because one, she wants him, and two, it's as good way as any to get herself out of a sticky situation.
After that though, she practically vanishes, and then returns to her father - pregnant.
The two of them move to Holland afterwards and six months into the pregnancy they're more than happy to wait out for little baby to arrive when they get a different sort of arrival.
Hal, having secured the regiment and outwitted his enemies, has been on the hunt for Minnie ever since that fateful night, and upon seeing she's with child - he correctly assumes it's his - he carries her right out of her father's shop, and before the old man has a chance to catch up with them, the two marry in front of a priest, making Minnie the Duchess of Pardloe.
If you think this condensed review is ANYTHING like the actual novella, I'll ask you to think again, and to go check it out. It's absolutely insane at times with the amount of intrigue and back-and-forth, and you can't easily cover it in any review.
But it's also incredibly enjoyable and one of those stories that makes you smile, heartfelt and poignant at the same time as funny and amusing.
Plus, Hal's my kind of character, at the end of the day.
So I'll always root for him.
xx
*image not mine
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