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A review by albamellark
Highland Gladiator by Kathryn Le Veque
4.0
Reseña en español: https://unalectorasalvaje.blogspot.com/2020/07/resena-highland-gladiator-kathryn-le.html
4/5
I love from the bottom of my heart everything related to the Scottish Highlands, especially in the time period where the clans still existed, because of the Outlander tv series and books. Recently, I have also become quite a huge fan of gladiators because I saw the Spartacus tv series that broke me into a thousand pieces. When I discovered this book, in which the title brings forward that it mixes this two themes that I adore, I knew right away that I needed to read it and that I was going to enjoy it.
Highland Gladiator is the first installment in the Scots and Swords series in which each book follows a different bunch of characters so they can be read separately. Nevertheless, I would recommend to follow the order of publication in case there are references or characters that appear in the following books of the series.
When he was a wee lass, Lor met a girl from the mountains near his home called Isabail. They took different paths but, some time later, they find each other again and start feelings things and becoming closer. Then Lor’s villa is attacked because of some conspiracy and the young man thinks that his grandfather, the one that has been taking care of him for his entire life, died in that attack. He doesn’t have anything left so he decides to look for the Ludus Caledonia, a place where man are turned into warriors because Lor wants to avenge his home and his grandfather. What he doesn’t know is that, maybe, he is planning to hurt the wrong people.
Highland Gladiator has two main characters with pretty different personalities. On one hand, Lor is a blacksmith that has to learn how to fight to become this warrior that will allow him to get his vengeance. He is a very honorable, humble man with his feet on the ground and that evolves a lot throughtout the pages. I think that he is a solid character with complexity and also connected a lot with him. He has this soft and beautiful heart that just made me fall in love with him.
On the other hand, Isabail is the daughter of the clan Keith’s chief that grew up learning strategy and warfare with her two brothers. What shoul I tell you about her? I adored her attitude and her strength to stand up whenever she feels something is not okay. It’s true that at the beginning I didn’t completely trust her but she earned my respect and my love pretty quickly. I think she is a good protagonist even though she is not as complex as Lor is.
Apart from them, there are this huge amount of side characters with different roles in the story. I particulary loved Lor’s mates in the Ludus Caledonia and I would have loved to get to know them better because they were really interesting and the author doesn’t really explore them. I also really liked Lor’s grandfather because he has a plot for himself that I didn’t expect and that I ended up enjoying a lot.
Historical fiction with some romance has become one of my favourite genres in the past few months and Highland Gladiator has earned a place in this list of incredible novels inside this genre that I love. It mixes political tensions and betrayals with the way the Ludus where gladiators train works and also with a pretty intense romance. The romance has importance within the story but these other themes also have relevance and are explored quite a lot. It’s obvious that the author did an extraordinary job at doing research about this period of time and about the culture and the costumes because the details that she brings in the book are very accurate.
This is the first book that I read of this author and I assure you that it won’t be my last. She has a pretty direct and simple writing style because, at the same time, it is elegant and with a lot of intensity that made me feel the same things as the characters. The dialogues are entertaining and I think that the action scenes are fast paced and easy to read without being confusing or something like that. I have to admit that some chapters were kind of slow but, in general, the pacing is good and I ended this book in a couple of days. It was an enjoyable reading.
As I have just mentioned, the romance is one of the foundations of this book so I wanted to talk a little bit about it. I consider that it is kind of rushed, the feelings begin to early in the story and when they don’t know each other much so it was kind of hard to believe it. I ended up liking their love story in spite of this beginning that I didn’t like as much. Lor and Isabail are so different that the interactions between them are so funny and interesting.
4/5
I love from the bottom of my heart everything related to the Scottish Highlands, especially in the time period where the clans still existed, because of the Outlander tv series and books. Recently, I have also become quite a huge fan of gladiators because I saw the Spartacus tv series that broke me into a thousand pieces. When I discovered this book, in which the title brings forward that it mixes this two themes that I adore, I knew right away that I needed to read it and that I was going to enjoy it.
Highland Gladiator is the first installment in the Scots and Swords series in which each book follows a different bunch of characters so they can be read separately. Nevertheless, I would recommend to follow the order of publication in case there are references or characters that appear in the following books of the series.
When he was a wee lass, Lor met a girl from the mountains near his home called Isabail. They took different paths but, some time later, they find each other again and start feelings things and becoming closer. Then Lor’s villa is attacked because of some conspiracy and the young man thinks that his grandfather, the one that has been taking care of him for his entire life, died in that attack. He doesn’t have anything left so he decides to look for the Ludus Caledonia, a place where man are turned into warriors because Lor wants to avenge his home and his grandfather. What he doesn’t know is that, maybe, he is planning to hurt the wrong people.
Highland Gladiator has two main characters with pretty different personalities. On one hand, Lor is a blacksmith that has to learn how to fight to become this warrior that will allow him to get his vengeance. He is a very honorable, humble man with his feet on the ground and that evolves a lot throughtout the pages. I think that he is a solid character with complexity and also connected a lot with him. He has this soft and beautiful heart that just made me fall in love with him.
On the other hand, Isabail is the daughter of the clan Keith’s chief that grew up learning strategy and warfare with her two brothers. What shoul I tell you about her? I adored her attitude and her strength to stand up whenever she feels something is not okay. It’s true that at the beginning I didn’t completely trust her but she earned my respect and my love pretty quickly. I think she is a good protagonist even though she is not as complex as Lor is.
Apart from them, there are this huge amount of side characters with different roles in the story. I particulary loved Lor’s mates in the Ludus Caledonia and I would have loved to get to know them better because they were really interesting and the author doesn’t really explore them. I also really liked Lor’s grandfather because he has a plot for himself that I didn’t expect and that I ended up enjoying a lot.
Historical fiction with some romance has become one of my favourite genres in the past few months and Highland Gladiator has earned a place in this list of incredible novels inside this genre that I love. It mixes political tensions and betrayals with the way the Ludus where gladiators train works and also with a pretty intense romance. The romance has importance within the story but these other themes also have relevance and are explored quite a lot. It’s obvious that the author did an extraordinary job at doing research about this period of time and about the culture and the costumes because the details that she brings in the book are very accurate.
This is the first book that I read of this author and I assure you that it won’t be my last. She has a pretty direct and simple writing style because, at the same time, it is elegant and with a lot of intensity that made me feel the same things as the characters. The dialogues are entertaining and I think that the action scenes are fast paced and easy to read without being confusing or something like that. I have to admit that some chapters were kind of slow but, in general, the pacing is good and I ended this book in a couple of days. It was an enjoyable reading.
As I have just mentioned, the romance is one of the foundations of this book so I wanted to talk a little bit about it. I consider that it is kind of rushed, the feelings begin to early in the story and when they don’t know each other much so it was kind of hard to believe it. I ended up liking their love story in spite of this beginning that I didn’t like as much. Lor and Isabail are so different that the interactions between them are so funny and interesting.