This is the second volume in D K Broster's Jacobite trilogy, telling the story of Ewen Cameron, laird of Ardroy on the west coast of Scotland and a loyal supporter of the Jacobite cause. The first volume, 'The Flight of the Heron' told of his involvement in the Jacobite insurrection following the landing at Glenfinnan of of Bonnie Prince Charlie, the feckless claimant to the British throne, and the subsequent Scottish invasion of England in 1745. Despite encountering very little organised resistance, the invaders travelled only as far south as Derby before losing momentum. Having returned north of the border, the Jacobite forces were suppressed by the standing British army, led by the Earl of Cumberland, and fought their final battle at Culloden Moor, a bleak tract of land a few miles south of Inverness, on 16 April 1745.

Following the defeat of the Jacobite army Cumberland's redcoats suppressed the local population with relentless cruelty, driving many of them into enforced emigration. Ewen Cameron himself escaped with his life but paid heavy fines and lost much of his former prosperity. As the second volume opens he is struggling to make a life for himself and his family, ruing the failure of the Jacobite rising, but largely reconciled to the fact that the old order will continue unchanged. However, at the end of a day of major family drama in which his elder son had contrived to push his younger brother into the deep loch, almost drowning him, Cameron is visited by his brother in law, Hector, who had signed up for the French Army following the rout at Culloden. He is, however, back in Scotland on a mission connected with the rebels' network, which still manages to distribute ever dwindling funds to rebel cells.

Despite his better judgement, Cameron finds himself being sucked back in to the Jacobite cause. This is a triumph of principle over rationale because in the months of the great campaign he had seen more than enough of Bonnie Prince Charlie himself to recognise his personal inadequacies and lack of fittedness for any position of power, although his belief in the legitimacy of the Jacobite claim remained undiminished.

The series of events that follow are a mixture of the farcical and the noble, yet all depicted with pellucid prose and an overwhelming plausibility. Cameron himself is all too fallible, but despite his constant wish to return to his home and family he forces himself to stay true to the cause, while all around him others fall by the moral wayside.

Broster obviously knew her locations very well and the scenery is beautifully described, and the bleak but splendid landscape almost becomes a character in its own right.

I am very surprised that these books aren't better known;, they certainly deserve to be ( )

This is the second volume in D K Broster's Jacobite trilogy, telling the story of Ewen Cameron, laird of Ardroy on the west coast of Scotland and a loyal supporter of the Jacobite cause. The first volume, 'The Flight of the Heron' told of his involvement in the Jacobite insurrection following the landing at Glenfinnan of of Bonnie Prince Charlie, the feckless claimant to the British throne, and the subsequent Scottish invasion of England in 1745. Despite encountering very little organised resistance, the invaders travelled only as far south as Derby before losing momentum. Having returned north of the border, the Jacobite forces were suppressed by the standing British army, led by the Earl of Cumberland, and fought their final battle at Culloden Moor, a bleak tract of land a few miles south of Inverness, on 16 April 1745.

Following the defeat of the Jacobite army Cumberland's redcoats suppressed the local population with relentless cruelty, driving many of them into enforced emigration. Ewen Cameron himself escaped with his life but paid heavy fines and lost much of his former prosperity. As the second volume opens he is struggling to make a life for himself and his family, ruing the failure of the Jacobite rising, but largely reconciled to the fact that the old order will continue unchanged. However, at the end of a day of major family drama in which his elder son had contrived to push his younger brother into the deep loch, almost drowning him, Cameron is visited by his brother in law, Hector, who had signed up for the French Army following the rout at Culloden. He is, however, back in Scotland on a mission connected with the rebels' network, which still manages to distribute ever dwindling funds to rebel cells.

Despite his better judgement, Cameron finds himself being sucked back in to the Jacobite cause. This is a triumph of principle over rationale because in the months of the great campaign he had seen more than enough of Bonnie Prince Charlie himself to recognise his personal inadequacies and lack of fittedness for any position of power, although his belief in the legitimacy of the Jacobite claim remained undiminished.

The series of events that follow are a mixture of the farcical and the noble, yet all depicted with pellucid prose and an overwhelming plausibility. Cameron himself is all too fallible, but despite his constant wish to return to his home and family he forces himself to stay true to the cause, while all around him others fall by the moral wayside.

Broster obviously knew her locations very well and the scenery is beautifully described, and the bleak but splendid landscape almost becomes a character in its own right.

I am very surprised that these books aren't better known;, they certainly deserve to be. ( )