Outlander
by Diana Gabaldon
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Book Summary Information
Author: Diana GabaldonEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1998-08-10
ISBN: 0385319959
Number of pages: 656
Publisher: Delta
Product features:
- ISBN13: 9780385319959
- Condition: New
- Notes: BRAND NEW FROM PUBLISHER! 100% Satisfaction Guarantee. Tracking provided on most orders. Buy with Confidence! Millions of books sold!
Book Reviews of Outlander
Book Review: A Novel or a Guide to Domestic Discipline?
Summary: 1 Stars
This whole review is one big ***spoiler alert***. Don't read this if you don't want spoilers! Also graphic descriptions alert!
We have Clarie and Frank, who are married and living in 1945. They've been married 8 years, even though many of those years were spent separately through WWII. She's a nurse and he's a professor, who is called up for duty to be an officer in the military. We have Jamie who lives in the 1740's and is a small time laird on the run. Frank has an ancestor back in the 1700's named Black Jack. He's evil and a whole lot more. The story is told in first person by Claire. Claire is annoying and you do not warm up to her. You feel she is mean about her husband being scholarly. So we have the bored housewife looking for adventure and fantasy story. This is what the author is selling. Bored in your marriage? I can only guess this to be the reason for so many 5 star ratings. Readers connected with Claire magically going from a boring marriage to an exciting fantasy one.
While having a second honeymoon with her husband Frank, Claire walks through a henge and finds herself in Scotland in the 1740's. I won't repeat the story, but eventually she finds herself married to Jamie, who is a laird on the run and protected by the Mackenzie clan. Too bad they weren't Jennifer Ashley's Mackenzie clan in 'The Madness of Lord Ian Mackenzie'. No such luck. These are bores who are all out to get each other. Jamie is a Mackenzie, but his father was a Fraser. Claire finds herself married to Jamie and accepts it readily and the great sex that goes with it... despite her safe, nice, intelligent, sexy, good in bed, professor of a husband, back in the 20th century. Oh right, Claire finds the history professor husband a tad boring.
Claire does not listen to an order from Jamie to stay put in a wooded area and hide. She finds that although Jamie is kind, he will still beat her for unknowingly putting men in danger. He forces her to be face down on a bed with his knee in her back to hold her down, while he beats her bare backside with his sword belt, while she screams her head off and can't sit for a week because he blistered her backside black and blue... and he will enjoy it too. Although he does it in private, everyone knows, because they hear her screaming in a bedroom and she is publicly humiliated. Claire was trying to get back to the 20th century, got caught by the English and Jamie had to save her. She does put his men in jeopardy. Jamie is never sorry for beating her. Worse, a few days later, he tells her he has to have sex with her, after she's been refusing him and basically tells her he'll have it with her no matter what. Well, doesn't that just smack of spousal rape? Claire is given no choice, even though she's upset with him for beating her.
I disagree with others that this is historically correct. There were laws against wife beating in 1700 in England and America. Scotland is part of England, so this is a dig on Scottish men still beating their wives against the laws that existed. Did it happen? Of course. Men still beat wives, but most men did not and do not... and most men like Jamie would not. He talks about his beatings as a boy and he thinks that beating children is fine, as long as they understand why they are being punished. Claire demands he never beat her again. He agrees. This all smacks loudly of the Christian Domestic Discipline (CDD) movement agreements. The author thinks beating children is okay as long as they understand why. Putting it under the guise of history is a thin veil. Most people who beat other people in the 1700's didn't think rationally about it, nor do they today. There is a witch burning also, as Claire and another woman are condemned. In 1742, witch burning? Oh yeah, this is backwards Scotland.
Claire is saved from being burned and there is a very dull story woven around talk of how belt beatings are a way to teach children and a way to make wives obey. It goes on ad nauseum about beating children with a belt... all under the guise of history. Yes it happened in history, but not quite the way the author makes it sound and she makes it sound like the people are rational people. Jamie on the other hand puts Claire in danger when he wants to make love to her in a wooded area, away from his group. She is nearly raped and killed by other men. Jamie pays no price for it. What is good for the goose (a beating), isn't good for the gander. He gets away with this and almost exposed his clan, but she gets beat for the same thing? What? This story fits more in the 16th and 17th centuries or Medieval times, as far as public beatings and witch burning, than it does in the 18th century. Oh yes, there are public beatings also.
As for prose, please... I know this is chick lit, but there is actually good chick lit out there. This is a first person narration. There aren't a whole lot of prose in this. Claire is an annoying character, so having it told in first person, was very annoying. In fact, it's more of a reporter type writing style. Just tell the facts. I didn't get a whole lot out of the prose. I can't believe this went on for 7 novels, which I will not be reading. Why do women want this? It's a fantasy. Leave your dull safe husband and go with a highlander who is hot looking, hot in bed and get the fantasy spanking of your life, because your own husband is oh so dull and would never hit you. As far as everyone fawning over the author's guts to write something historically correct, it really isn't historically correct, for all the reasons above and more to come. Most people who beat others, were too ignorant to really think it through the way Jamie does, as if he's a 20th century man.
Some last points. There is a girl in the book. Her father brings her to the great Mackenzie hall to talk to the Mackenzie laird. He wants his daughter publicly beaten with a belt, in front of everyone, because she flirts with men. A public beating is humiliating and the father wants her humiliated to stop her ways. Instead of the girl getting beaten, Jamie takes the punishment for her. He likes to kiss her, thinks he's a bit at fault and takes her punishment for her... but not for his wife later on? Isn't he responsible for his wife's actions too? Jamie leaves Claire alone in the woods with no one to protect her. Isn't he a hypocrite? Too late does he send someone to look after Claire.
Okay, what really bothers me? The girl's father wants a good marriage for her and deems Jamie not suitable. This is before he is married to Claire. What father would publicly announce to the hall that his daughter is a flirt? What prospects of marriage will she have after that? Why is she always at the hall with her father not in sight? Wouldn't her father beat her privately to keep her in check and not announce to the whole town that his daughter is acting the flirt? Won't the men think she is ruined? If she is in the hall because she is a servant there, then Jamie is actually a good catch, being the laird's nephew. That made no sense at all and there is plenty of that nonsense in the book. Jamie does not want Claire to have children and put her through that 'pain', but gave her 20 lashes with his sword belt... and that is not pain? He's twice her size! There is a whole lot that doesn't make sense about this book.
Wait there's more. Claire has two Catholic marriages, but was only baptized in the Catholic church and nothing else. You cannot get married in a Catholic church, be a Catholic and not have gone as far as getting Confirmed. She did not do Confirmation and therefore the priest in the story is wrong. Her marriages were not legitimate Catholic ones. The priest excuses her actions and her double marriages. There is a paradox here of time travel. If Claire's first husband's great great great great grandfather is killed and supposedly he is, then Frank her first husband would never be born. Claire thinks about this, but not the fact that if Frank wasn't born, she'd not be back in the 1740's, since it was Frank that took her on a trip to Scotland where the henge is with the time travel stones! Paradox. The ending is just lovely with Black Jack or the ancestor of Frank beating and raping Jamie. The ancestor is gay, but he will have a child eventually. Okay, whatever, but don't make every gay guy in the book to be a child molester or a rapist and that is exactly what the author does.
Jamie has been whipped and beaten so many times by Black Jack and his men, that you think he's the second coming of Christ, because who else could live through all the broken bones and near death experiences. I'm surprised the author didn't have him walk on water to boot. Claire happily forgets her first marriage, because a priest tells her to. She never really feels bad about it. You don't really feel the love from her or why she loves either husband. You do feel Jamie's love, after he beats the heck out of her. Except for sex, I don't get why Claire loves anyone. She just seems to like sex. Jamie isn't the brightest of light bulbs either. His reasoning is flawed. His love isn't and if you can forget the beating, he is sincere in that regard. Claire is older than he and is a lot more sophisticated. You don't know why she'd be bored with her scholarly husband and want a barbarian. They do make Jamie out to be one in 1742. That is not the middle ages and so, the whole thing just doesn't fit. The history of Bonny Prince Charlie is glossed over. Very annoying.
I can't believe I read the whole thing, but I did and the whole thing disgusted me. I had to see why everyone thought this was the number one romance novel of all time. I cannot believe this received 4 1/2 stars plus and a RITA... and they want to make a movie about it?! Good grief. Why this book, when there are so many, that are so much better? I have no idea. This is really bad writing. Really bad. The whole thing is so unbelievable. The whole books is about beatings and torture to the point of stupidity. The author spends time on irrelevant detail and misses out on telling a better story. I've read hundreds and hundreds of romance novels and this is one of the worst. Why not 'Gentle Rogue' as a movie or any number of other huge romance hits? I expected the level of writing that was in 'Flowers from the Storm' by another author. Please, someone hand me Pride and Prejudice, because Jane Austen is rolling over in her grave.
Summary of Outlander
Unrivaled storytelling ... unforgettable characters ... rich historical detail ... these are the hallmarks of Diana Gabaldon's work. Her New York Times bestselling Outlander novels have earned the praise of critics and captured millions of readers.Here is the story that started it all, introducing two remarkable characters, Claire Randall and Jamie Fraser, in a spellbinding novel of passion and history that combines exhilarating adventure with a love story for the ages....
The year is 1945. Claire Randall, a former combat nurse, is back from the war and reunited with her husband on a second honeymoon ? when she walks through a standing stone in one of the ancient stone circles that dot the British Isles. Suddenly she is a Sassenach ? an "outlander" ? in a Scotland torn by war and raiding Highland clans in the year of Our Lord ... 1743.
Hurled back in time by forces she cannot understand, Claire is catapulted into intrigues and dangers that may threaten her life ... and shatter her heart. For here she meets James Fraser, a gallant young Scots warrior, and becomes a woman torn between fidelity and desire ... and between two vastly different men in two irreconcilable lives.
In Outlander, a 600-page time-travel romance, strong-willed and sensual Claire Randall leads a double life with a husband in one century, and a lover in another. Torn between fidelity and desire, she struggles to understand the pure intent of her heart. But don't let the number of pages and the Scottish dialect scare you. It's one of the fastest reads you'll have in your library.
While on her second honeymoon in the British Isles, Claire touches a boulder that hurls her back in time to the forbidden Castle Leoch with the MacKenzie clan. Not understanding the forces that brought her there, she becomes ensnared in life-threatening situations with a Scots warrior named James Fraser. But it isn't all spies and drudgery that she must endure. For amid her new surroundings and the terrors she faces, she is lured into love and passion like she's never known before.
I was lame and sore in every muscle when I woke next morning. I shuffled to the privy closet, then to the wash basin. My innards felt like churned butter. It felt as though I had been beaten with a blunt object, I reflected, then thought that that was very near the truth. The blunt object in question was visible as I came back to bed, looking now relatively harmless. Its possessor [Jamie] woke as I sat next to him, and examined me with something that looked very much like male smugness."Gabaldon creates characters that you'll remember, laugh with, cry with, and cheer for long after you've finished the book. --Candy Paape
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