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expendablemudge 's review for:
Lord John and the Hand of Devils
by Diana Gabaldon
Rating: 3.25* of five
Gabaldon's writing is of the kind I call "serviceable" but her characters either make you swoon, pant, sweat and holler, or they leave you completely cold. I fall on the non-hollerin' end of category A. I like these people, Lord John especially having a claim on me because he's a shirt-lifter (or Warmbruder, depending on where we are geographically).
This book is a collection of three novellas that Gabaldon wrote about the good Major Lord John Grey. One was written for this collection. Does it matter what they're about? Lord John, in peace or at war, will never suffer a wrong he can right to go unrighted; he will never allow personal comfort or convenience to stand in the way of what duty and honor require him to do; and he will never fall out of love with Jamie Fraser, featured in Gabaldon's main time travel romance series as the husband of the time traveler.
So he don't get none. Relax, ewww-ickers.
Anyway, in a marketplace crowded with mystery choices, and quite a fair few eighteenth-century historicals at that, why choose these books with their serviceable writing? Bruce Alexander, for one example, is a better writer. His Blind Justice series is very good.
Simple: Depth. Lord John Grey is part of a well-known alternate world. It's obvious that Gabaldon could act as a tour guide to eighteenth-century England and Scotland, and it's obvious that SOMEwhere in a properly ordered Creation, Jamie and Claire and Lord John are plying their different courses through the time streams. The reason to read this series starts and stops with an individual's familiarity with or receptivity to Gabaldon's world. If you've read Dragonfly in Amber and did not find it so tedious and plodding as to make you beg a merciful Goddess for death or blindness, you're likely to enjoy these books.
Recommended? Oh, sure. Why not. Start with these novellas and see if the character appeals; if so, the novels await your pleasure.
Gabaldon's writing is of the kind I call "serviceable" but her characters either make you swoon, pant, sweat and holler, or they leave you completely cold. I fall on the non-hollerin' end of category A. I like these people, Lord John especially having a claim on me because he's a shirt-lifter (or Warmbruder, depending on where we are geographically).
This book is a collection of three novellas that Gabaldon wrote about the good Major Lord John Grey. One was written for this collection. Does it matter what they're about? Lord John, in peace or at war, will never suffer a wrong he can right to go unrighted; he will never allow personal comfort or convenience to stand in the way of what duty and honor require him to do; and he will never fall out of love with Jamie Fraser, featured in Gabaldon's main time travel romance series as the husband of the time traveler.
So he don't get none. Relax, ewww-ickers.
Anyway, in a marketplace crowded with mystery choices, and quite a fair few eighteenth-century historicals at that, why choose these books with their serviceable writing? Bruce Alexander, for one example, is a better writer. His Blind Justice series is very good.
Simple: Depth. Lord John Grey is part of a well-known alternate world. It's obvious that Gabaldon could act as a tour guide to eighteenth-century England and Scotland, and it's obvious that SOMEwhere in a properly ordered Creation, Jamie and Claire and Lord John are plying their different courses through the time streams. The reason to read this series starts and stops with an individual's familiarity with or receptivity to Gabaldon's world. If you've read Dragonfly in Amber and did not find it so tedious and plodding as to make you beg a merciful Goddess for death or blindness, you're likely to enjoy these books.
Recommended? Oh, sure. Why not. Start with these novellas and see if the character appeals; if so, the novels await your pleasure.