Book Reviews | Outlander
Outlander, by Diana Gabaldon
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ISBN: 0440212561
Publisher: Dell
Release Date: Reissue edition (June 2, 1992)
List Price: $7.99
Reviewed by Ann Peake
World War II has just ended. After a lengthy separation, British combat nurse Claire Beauchamp Randall looks forward to becoming reacquainted with her genealogically obsessed husband. Plans go horribly awry. While the two vacation, Claire steps through ancient standing stones and finds herself catapulted to 1743 Scotland on the eve of the Jacobite Uprising. The Scottish Highlands brim with loyalists, spies and the dreaded English, and Claire stumbles from the stones into the middle of a small battle. She’s rescued by a band of burly Scotsman from Clan MacKenzie, led by two cunningly dangerous brothers. Unfortunately, she also manages to capture the interest of an English dragoon captain, “Black Jack” Randall, an ancient ancestor of her husband. To save her from arrest as a spy at the hands of the nefarious Captain Randall, Claire is forced to marry a MacKenzie clansman by the name of Jamie Frazier.
And so Claire must use her nursing skills and her resourcefulness to evade Black Jack Randall, as depraved a villain as ever existed, who becomes obsessed with discovering her secret. Randall also has a base interest in Claire’s new husband, and hunts the two relentlessly. In a twist, Claire, who knows the day of Randall’s death, must protect him in order to protect a husband awaiting her return to the future. Meanwhile, the MacKenzie brothers, also unsure of Claire’s loyalties, present her with a far more immediate threat. And as Claire struggles to return to the standing stones in hopes of finding her way back to her own time, she moralizes about her growing attachment to her handsome and ever so noble new husband, Jamie Frazier.
Impeccably researched, Outlander by Diana Gabaldon traverses the most turbulent period in Scottish history as seen through the modern eyes of Claire Beauchamp Randall Frazier. In this way, Gabaldon appeals to readers of both historical and contemporary fiction, engaging them with rich, vibrant characters who linger in hearts and minds long after the last page is read.
