chelseasofia 's review for:

Lord John and the Brotherhood of the Blade by Diana Gabaldon

5.0

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious relaxing tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

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This was great, even better than “Private Matter” because it was a more personal story having to do with LJs family, his and his family’s honor, and his identity as a man, soldier, and as a gay man. It is still written (like Private Matter) in a way where all the many threads of the story end up intertwining by the end, and the complexity of events and characters can be a little confusing sometimes. Barely mentioned characters early on become important later, etc. I had to go back into the ebook to search for names to remember things said. All that said, this was a beautiful book.

Even though all the LJ books are meant to be standalones I am reading them in order, including the short stories, (I had read some of them previously and out of order) and I am getting *a lot* more out of them this way. The continued relationships he has with different people (esp Herr Hauptman in this book and the prior short story [Succubus], and one James Fraser [some real interesting moments between them here] and LJ’s family in all the stories) take on more meaning and seem to fill the exchanges with much more weight.  It’s pretty beautiful. The actual conclusion to the events in this book are also quite exciting, nail biting moments. The last lines gutted me as one of the threads of the story and a relationship of his concludes. 

I highly recommend this book, but preferably read in order with all the stories. Also, I must continue to praise the audiobooks read by Jeff Woodman that bring even more color and character to the stories. I think my love for the stories is buoyed by the audiobooks and I can’t recommend them enough. I continue on my journey!