" Scouring the darkest corners of the Highlands and Western Isles, Robert the Bruce handpicks ten warriors to help him in his quest to free Scotland from English rule. They are the best of the best, chosen for their superior skills in each discipline of warfare and known as The Highland Guard."
It's Valentine's Day this coming Wednesday, February 14th, and if you happen to be single there is really no need to be miserable with these novels to hand! The Highland Guard series are racy romance novels set during the time of the Scottish Wars of Independence. Books find me in the strangest of ways and I first came across this series while watching a film called A Princess for Christmas, when a maid takes one of these books out of a suitcase. The cover art drew me in, so I looked it up on Amazon and was delighted to see that the books are about my hero, Robert the Bruce! So of course I had to order them.
There are at least a dozen books in the series (oh the joy of it!) and I have the first seven. I have read the first two books, The Chief and The Hawk and I loved them both, but I think The Hawk was my favourite by a slight margin because the female protagonist, Ellie, has a personality that matches my own. By that I mean that she doesn't take shite from any man, no matter how tall and handsome and strong he may be, nor is she overly impressed by his arrogant warrior charms. In fact, she repeatedly puts her love interest in his place good and proper and I was rooting for her the whole time. You tell him love, don't put up with that shit!
Each novel begins with an overview of where Robert the Bruce is in his mission to win Scotland back from the English. The first novel, The Chief, details the killing of Red Comyn and the crowning of the Bruce as King of Scots. The second book, The Hawk, begins with the legend of Bruce in the cave with the inspirational spider. So you can pin point the moment in history that these fictional love stories occur. This lends a great sense of time and place to the novels. The Highland landscape and the Western Isles are beautifully described and extremely accurate. I felt like I was back in the Highlands myself as I read these books.
There are ten men in the Highland Guard and each novel is one man's story of love and war. Each book is complete in itself and could stand alone, so you wouldn't necessarily have to read them in order, but I do prefer to read them chronologically myself, as I enjoy working through the historical timeline of Robert the Bruce and his fight for Scottish Independence. He is more of a background character in these novels though, so if you are looking for novels with him as the main protagonist, I recommend Nigel Tranter's The Bruce Trilogy, which is fantastic.
The Highland Guard novels are romances, with a decent dose of fun and frolic, battle and warfare mixed in. These are the first Scottish novels I have read that have remained true to how the Scots actually speak. For instance, a Scotsman will never tell you that he'll see you tonight; he'll say "I'll be seeing ye the night lassie", which means exactly the same thing, it's just their way of speaking. In many Scottish novels, this subtle dialect has been edited out and put into 'proper English'. But the Scots will never be English and to lose this kind of dialect means that you lose the culture and flavour of a nation which is proud to stand apart from the rest of the UK.
There are also references made to the Highlanders Viking heritage which is great, but if I had to pick one gripe with the books, it is that the warriors invoke the Greek god Hades. This doesn't ring true to me, or to the Highlanders of Scandinavian origin, that I know. I never once heard my friend Alexander call on Hades in temper; he only ever mentioned Thor, and he wore a small Thor's Hammer on a leather thong around his neck. He's half Viking, half Highlander and the Greek gods are beneath him!
I would have preferred the characters to invoke one of the Norse or Celtic gods, say Odin, Norse Lord of the Wild Hunt, or Arawn, Celtic god of the Otherworld, who are both comparable to Hades and more likely to be invoked in the Highlands, even to this day. Maybe even Thor, being Norse god of war, or the Morrigan, the Celtic battle goddess, would have rung more true to me and to the Highlanders that I know. I must stress though, that these jarring references to Hades do not spoil the story one bit, or my enjoyment of the books. These novels are great and I highly recommend them.
I'd never read any of Monica McCarty's novels before, but I shall certainly be buying the rest of the Highland Guard series and I shall look out for more of her other books too. She has fast become one of my favourite authors of Scottish romance and I am looking forward to seeing how history plays out in the rest of the books. Her novels are quite racy in places, but no worse than Phillipa Gregory's novels. And you do need a bit of spice come Valentine's Day!
If you have enjoyed Outlander and you like Scottish novels, or want to learn more about Robert the Bruce and the Scottish Wars of Independence but in a fun way, then the Highland Guard books will be right up your street. I have so much enjoyed the first two novels and I plan to take the third novel, The Ranger, to bed with me tonight.
So treat yourself this Valentine's Day to a nice bottle of wine, a box of chocolates and one of the Highland Guard novels...because when you've spent time between the covers with one of these bare-chested, kilted, gorgeous warrior heartthrobs - well then, a real boyfriend would just prove himself to be disappointing! Cue the Valentine music and dare to dream into infinity...∞ Happy Valentine's Day!
💘
xxx
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