Outlander
Dell Paperback, 1992
ISBN: 0-440-21256-1
Monika says:
In 1945, former English army nurse Claire Randall is transported to the
18th century after touching a standing stone in one of the stone circles
found throughout Great Britain. After just having been reunited with her
beloved husband Frank, a historian, they are separated again, not by war
this time, but in a way that doesn't allow her to return to him by normal
means. Soon after her arrival in the year 1743, she finds herself face to
face with Jonathan Randall, unmistakably an ancestor of Frank's and his
uncanny double. But much as he resembles Frank physically, his personality
turns out to be not at all the same.
Claire manages to escape from him and meets Jamie Fraser, a young Scot
who has a price on his head for alleged murder. The two of them continue
on their way together for practical reasons in the first place, but soon a
passionate relationship develops between them, and Claire is drawn deeper
and deeper into the schemes of the McKenzie clan. Despite being a Sassenach,
as Scots use to call the English, she acquires a certain status because of
her medical knowledge and begins to feel comfortable in this strange world
that isn't her own.
Outlander is the first installment in a series of five books, at
least two more are yet to follow. Diana Gabaldon has written a nine
hundred-page introduction to her world, and not one of those pages is
boring. I always look at thick books with a wary eye, because most of the
time the author gets sidetracked by lengthy, boring descriptions (like Ken
Follett in The Pillars of the Earth which I put down more than once
to read something else instead), but in Outlander every detail
seems to have its place; I can't see where the manuscript could have been
shortened without the story losing something.
If you are familiar with my reviews you should know by now that I find
the subject of time travel fascinating. You can already see in this first
volume that Gabaldon’s take on the subject is different from other
authors’, it's not just a means to transport Claire to the past, but it
does have consequences. But the most appealing thing in those books are
the three-dimensional, believable characters. As much as I like to read
books like the novels of Michael Crichton where action comes before
character development, good characterization is something I truly
appreciate in a novel. There's enough excitement in Outlander for
my taste, and I am grateful for Claire not being a supernatural heroine,
so beautiful that all men fall for her immediately, like we see it way too
often in other books. Even though the love story between Claire and Jamie
is a major plot element, the book isn't a soap opera. Their relationship
is all the more interesting because both of them have to deal with the
unknown. Claire has been thrown into an epoch where women are still more
or less the possession of their husbands, and Jamie finds himself
confronted with a wife that is a lot more emancipated than the women of
his own time. Actually, Claire is a remarkably emancipated woman, even
considered by the standards of the 1940ies where women usually weren't as
self-confident and independent as she is.
The Scottish and Gaelic in the book makes you feel like being in the
Highlands yourself, it creates a certain atmosphere that makes you see
this magnificent landscape before your inner eye. Outlander will
definitely make you curious about the next books in the series. |
Any comments? Write us:
Monika
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