Dinna fash yersel'
http://www.lynsaysands.net/
Hey, guess what! Get ready to journey back to the good old days of Scotland. Yep, those were the days when lassies were lassies and laddies were brawny and said "dinna" a lot.
It's been a while since I've read a Lindsay Sands. I couldn't remember why I didn't read her anymore. I remember loving The Deed. I also remember enjoying her vampire books, until I became tired of the gazillion cell-phone conversation her characters had. Regardless, I picked up Surrender to the Highlander and started to read. I actually found myself enjoying it and then something happened - I remembered why I haven't read Ms. Sands in a while. Let's examine my epiphany.
Our main characters in this story are Edith Drummond and Neils Buchanan. By the way, Neils Buchanan is the series connector. He has a bunch of brothers: Alick, Geordie, and Rory. Rory is the doctor-brother. There is also a sister by the name of Saidh, but her story was the previous one. Hey, and by the way, how does one pronounce Saidh? I went online and listened to different pronunciations. There were all kinds of pronunciations, from said, as in said, to c-ad, c-ed, sin-o, ci-ad, ce-ad-ded, sid and just plain c. I bet I'm not the only one who becomes distracted when it comes to certain Romanceland names. They may look pretty, but pronouncing them is a whole different matter. Anyway, back to Edith and Neils.
Saidh is worried about her friend Edith. She hasn't heard from her in a long time and she is suspicious of things not quite right at the Drummond castle. But, Saidh can't find out because she's about 20 months pregnant with a giant cow and cannot ride a horse to the Drummond castle. Her husband will not leave her side, so she coerces her brothers into investigating. The four brothers grudgingly agree and they are off.
Getting into the castle. When they arrive at the castle they are not allowed into it and a very long funny scene begins between the brothers and the guards. It reminded me a little of an old Laurel and Hardy movie. Eventually the four brothers are allowed into the castle and we meet more characters: Ronson, the cute Romanceland orphan boy with his trusty giant dog, Laddie; Ronson's grandmother; Tormod, the Laird's first; and Cawley, the Laird's second. There are also a bunch of assorted servants all over the place. It's actually quite crowded. It has to be crowded because someone is killing them off and the more people who get murdered, the smaller our suspects list becomes. Edith's father and two of her brothers have already died, and someone has poisoned her. Her brother, Brodie has taken off along with his wife, and are in hiding - at least that's what we are told. Oh, I forgot, there may be spoilers ahead, to say nothing of the red herrings.
Anyway, someone has poisoned poor Edith and she's in some kind of poison coma. Lucky for her Rory is a doctor and after lots and lots of discussion by all the guys, they arrive at the conclusion that her food was poisoned or maybe it was her mead or cider - whatever, there was a bigggg discussion. I did not know which of the brothers Edith was going to end up with. At first I thought maybe Rory was the one, but ‘twas not to be. Nope, Neils was the first one Edith's eyes landed on when she finally opened them. Well, not really the first one, that would be the snoring Alick. Alick was on guard duty. Neils was the first one whose arms she collapsed into. She is instantly attracted to Neils and they start to talk about who is trying to murder her. He and his brothers and her servants try to protect her, but she occasionally turns into a TSTL heroine and wanders off into the castle by herself. She just cannot abide waking poor Neils from his sound sleep, the poor dear, even if someone is poisoning her food and shooting arrows at her. She just tip-toes over him. Another sleeping brother on guard duty.
How to catch a murderer. It was while I was reading a scene in which a detailed discussion was going on that my light bulb went off. A bunch of the guys were talking, in detail, on how to catch the killer. Now I remembered why I haven't read Ms. Sands in a while. These how-to discussions were done more than once in this book and were all quite pointless. They had to have been word count fillers I see no other reason for them being there. There were pages and pages of things like - I paraphrase: "you walk into a room and turn around and say, “oh, where is so and so”. Then turn to your left and trip over the stairs and then say, so everyone can hear, “I'm going up stairs now - by myself - all alone - with no one to protect me”. Then Tormod will go here and Rory will go there and Neils will go there and Alick will be under the bed waiting". On and on and on and on. Then you know what? Someone gets thrown over the castle wall and the conspirators don't do the plan. They forget their brother under the bed. None of the clever we-have-a-plan conspirators see anything. There wasn’t anyone in the hallway, stairs, closet, table, chair, etc. The whole conversation was a waste of time. Then I was presented with an OMG moment.
OMG moment. So, we have a killer on the loose. We don't know who. We don't know how they are getting from place to place without being seen. We have discussions, and plans, and more discussions and a heroine who just can't seem to stay in one place. Tormod. You remember Tormod? He's the big kahuna of the castle, he's the First, the guard, the protector. Oh, geewillikers guys, did Tormod forget to mention there are secret passages thourghout the castle? Really, Tormod! Do you think it might have come in handy to know there were secret passages? And, this is the guy who is supposed to be guarding the castle. But wait, there are more moments in this story. Our Ewwwwww moment.
Ewwwwww moment. Edith is a total innocent, I mean she is a clueless innocent. She and Neils marry part way through the story. She wants to please her man, so she asks her maid for instructions. Actually, some of this discussion was quite humorous. Edith has no idea what her maid is talking about. I even chuckled through their conversation. If only Ms. Sands hadn't gone a step further. Ms. Sands just doesn’t seem to know when to stop. You see innocent Edith, on the advice of her maid, smears some kind of dark fruit preserve all over Neils winkee-dink. (This is to make it taste good.) But, she hasn’t stopped there, she has inserted some preserve in her lady-channel, if you know what I mean. Well, my little Petunia's, remember Edith has been poisoned in the past. It seems that once again she has been poisoned and in the middle of enjoying the placements of preserves, she throws up. All over everything, including Neils' Timothy Toad. You might think that's the Ewwwwww moment - nope. Rory, the doctor-brother, sees Neils’ preserve-laden Timothy Toad and suggests that Neils clean up. He also suggests that Neils clean up Edith because he can see preserves "seeping" from her golden vessel. That was my Ewwwwww moment. But wait, there is one more moment; the villain wrap-up moment.
The villain wrap-up moment. You know over the years, I have seen movies or read books which have villains exposing allllll the reasons they have for killing a gazillion people. This is the first time I have ever seen the heroine, the woman who the villain is trying to kill, sit down with the villain and discuss allll the reasons why. It was just toooo ridiculous for words. By the way the death toll was 14 in this book, not counting the horses.
Bottom line. What started out as a humorous romantic story took a turn half way through. The conversations surrounding the “who-done-its” were just pointless. The heroine, the First, and the brothers were not the brightest bulbs in the package. And, there were just too many "moments" which kicked me out of the story. This book did not work for me, I was very disappointed that what started out promising ended up being very awkward. Sorry to say I cannot recommend Surrender to the Highlander.
Time/Place: Generic time Scotland
Sensuality: Warm/Hot
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