The Adventurer
Grade : F

Egad. Here we go again. Another Scottish historical with badly written brogue. "While ye're aff sleepin' in the grass like a bluidy lamb, Lachlann and I are working our arses off pullin' stones outta tha' scabbert excuse for a field . . . You hinna gathered a single winkle all the day!" No. Not a single winkle. Ach.

I once read a book designed to teach authors how to write dialogue; in fact, I've read several. In the chapters devoted to writing dialect, the instructor/authors all said the same thing: don't. People read with their own speech patterns in their heads. Were I Scottish, and were I to read the quote above, I'm not sure I'd understand what the writer was trying to convey. I also might be just a bluidy wee bit insulted. Nevertheless, romance novels continue to grind out dialectic brogue, and I continue to find it annoying and distracting, hard to read and interpret. It interrupts the flow of the story, which is not a good thing. If authors think dialect makes their dialogue seem authentic, it doesn't. A few choice words here and there, a rhythm of speech, and certain colloquialisms are all it would take to lend authenticity. The entirety of The Adventurer is written in faux Scottish dialect and is annoying in the extreme.

The Adventurer is second in this author's Highland Heroes trilogy, the first book, The Pretender having introduced Elizabeth, sister to Isabella Drayton, the heroine of this book. If you didn't read The Adventurer, not to worry. Isabella recounts virtually Elizabeth's entire story in her head while the reader waits patiently for The Adventurer to begin.

Having said that, be warned that the first third of this book is devoted to back story. When we finally do get into The Adventurer itself, we find our hero, Calum MacKay, to be pretty much second-rate. He does nothing himself. He waits at Castle Wrath while his crew ventures out. He does not kidnap Isabella himself, his crew does. And in the end, when the chips are down, it's somebody else who winds up hurt. Ultimately, Calum's entire goal, that of rescuing a particular person, becomes moot as well. Not exactly your action hero.

Calum is a privateer, plundering English ships and releasing Scottish prisoners in the process of being transported. Of course, we never actually see Calum doing this, since he's a stay-at-home hero, watching TV and eating bon-bons, as it were. He meets Isabella (after her protracted and unnecessary visit to Versailles where she dines with the king and his mistress, neither of whom ever appear in the story again), when the captain of Calum's ship, The Adventurer, is in the process of plundering a passenger vessel. While at Versailles, a stranger had given Isabella a magical crystal that she must wear until she identifies the true leader of the MacKay clan, whom she has never met. What a coincidence to have her ship boarded by the very same clan she is supposed to find! When the captain spies her wearing the stone around her neck, he kidnaps her to bring to Calum so he can find out who she is and where she got the stone.

Now, historically, Culloden is not far behind them, yet none of the Scottish pirates, nay, not even the ones who have lost everything, hold any animosity toward the very English lady they have imprisoned in the tower. A character named M'Quik has his horrid Culloden story recounted at least three times, yet he becomes Isabella's first friend and pseudo-matchmaker between her and Calum. Right.

If this review isn't making much sense to you, that's because the book made so little sense to me. It's obviously the middle book in a series and does not stand alone on its own merits. It spends too much time recounting what happened to all the characters in the first book, then goes on to set up the third book in the trilogy. There is so little going on in The Adventurer, it may just as well never have been written.

Calum and Isabella fall in love. I'm not sure why, except they are in close proximity, are both young and single. Though she is his enemy, he doesn't abuse or rape her; she bakes him a birthday cake. Sounds like a match to me. They do spend some time together, and are both likable enough, but their story is not engaging at all. Plus, Calum spends the entire story with wildly long hair and a full, scraggly beard.

There is virtually no conflict in the story, and I'll tell you, the relationship between a Scottish privateer with a bone to pick of his own just after Culloden, and an English duke's daughter should have been rife with conflict and action, but it wasn't. Not even when Isabella's veddy English, loyal-to-the-enemy's-king father shows up. Only one character stirs things up a bit, and he's straight from central-casting.

Ultimately, the secret of the stone is revealed, sort of. The villain does his thing, kind of. Calum and Isabella marry, in a way. A stupefyingly (and previously un-alluded to) surprise character's fate is left open, and another character who is off-screen after the beginning of the book is referenced at the end. Uninspired and unsatisfying, to say the least, and the biggest question of all is never answered.

If you read The Pretender you may want to delve into The Adventurer just to see what's going on, but, in my opinion, it's not much.

Reviewed by Marianne Stillings
Grade : F

Sensuality: Warm

Review Date : November 12, 2002

Publication Date: 2002

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