Friday, May 9, 2008

Sword of the Highlands-Veronica Wolff

Sword of the Highlands
Veronica Wolff
Berkley, Jun 2008, $6.99
ISBN: 9780425222485

Her boss Walter, principal curator at the MOMA, asks his sister art curator Magda Deacon to come to the Metropolitan to see an oil painting he wants added to the exhibit Finding Arcadia: Pastoral Paintings of the seventieth Century she put together. She is stunned when she sees the painting and wonders if her brother is right about too many carbs as she is attracted to the portrait of Lord James Graham, the first Marquis of Montrose. She cannot stop herself from touching his face. Shockingly that caress sends Magda back through time into James’ bed.

A noted womanizer James is excited with finding a beautiful female occupying his bed. However, her behavior is brazen as she is not bashful with intelligent opinions on all sorts of topics including independence, freedom and leadership. She also beats the guys at golf and rides a horse like a man. However in his bed she is his woman. As they fall in love James is irate at the demands of his monarch to support a foolish war. However he becomes preoccupied with saving his beloved when his enemy Lord Campbell abducts her.

Although somewhat similar in tone to Virginia Wolff’s previous time travel romance (see MASTER OF THE HIGHLANDS), this is an engaging tale as a twenty-first century Manhattan female takes over seventeenth century Highlands Scotland. The story line is fast-paced, but it is owned by the computer age woman who knows what she wants in and out of bed and the laird mesmerized by this intelligent sexy anachronism. Their romance makes for a fun read.

Harriet Klausner

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