the making of a highlander by elisa braden
"What if I wish to stay here, where there's nothin' but snow and darkness?"
"Then, I'll build a fire in your hearth to rival Hades."
hi from 36,000 feet in the air. flying right over japan with 2.5 hours left on this flight. I have watched nary a movie but I did finish reading the making of a highlander by elisa braden. this review will be pretty rough and ready because I have been in transit for, like, 18 hours and I'm running on 4 hours of sleep. but I have thoughts and they must be recorded!
the making of a highlander is the first book in elisa braden's midnight in scotland series. this was meant to be part of my "romance but burn them at the stake" objective, which is to say books featuring witches...? but sadly I was not discriminating in my reddit research, and this book was witch-adjacent at best.
so the book begins with the disappearance of annie macpherson tulloch's longtime ghost friend, finlay. annie receives a vision and determines that she needs to marry a lord to bring finlay back... but to marry a lord, she first needs to learn how to be a lady – so she starts taking lady lessons from her hot annoying englishman neighbor, john huxley, who coincidentally also needs someone to help him win one of the contests at the glenscannadoo highland games... and who better to teach him than someone who comes from the family of undefeated champions?
Returning the iron to its holder, he pivoted to examine her – the red hair, ragged and banner-bright. Eyes so direct, they stripped a man of his will. A mouth that scalded without mercy. And her clothing. Good God, she needed a modiste. Did she even wear a corset?
the story seems simple on paper, but the author weaves in a bunch of other story elements that give a nice complexity to the book. I actually wish she had spent more time on these plot beats, because I felt like tensions were resolved a little too tidily for my taste. but I liked the ambition overall and it made for a really engaging & delightfully mystical story.
things I enjoyed: ghosts, whisky underworld B-plot, handmade kilts, lady lessons, trunk throwing contests...?, good bread, good gravy!, scotland, a relative lack of gentry, and the best family dynamics ever.
things I did not enjoy: "sheath" as a euphemism for vagina, improper grammatical usage of "then," insufficient angst due to the female protagonist being super chill when the male love interest fucks up.
this book would've been vastly improved had there been greater consequences to the ruptures in the relationship between john huxley and annie I-forget-her-actual-last-name but she's the stepdaughter of hot dad angus macpherson so we'll just go with that. I felt like she was too easygoing, and it would've been nice to see her engaging with her hurt feelings more? I sensed a lot of spiritual bypassing~
the major relationship barriers (john lying to annie about his identity, john not believing her about finlay – both of which are supposed to be big dealbreakers for annie) were resolved a little too easily. there was buildup and pain... and then it sort of fizzled. oftentimes due to lust. which, to be honest, cheapened my reading of their relationship at times. I would have loved to see them working a little harder for one another!
Something foreign moved through him. He couldn't name it. Couldn't describe it. All he knew was that the wistful note in her voice made him want to howl.
that said, there was so much to love about the making of a highlander. I loved annie as a character – a devoted free spirit, raised by a bunch of slightly emotionally unavailable yet lovable dudes. she was charming and funny and she was totally giving merida from brave.
Annie Tulloch changing herself into a watercolor miss indistinguishable from any other woman felt wrong. Her reasons for doing so felt worse, like destroying a vivid Goya painting to sell a common gilt frame.
I also absolutely adored the macpherson clan, and the dynamics between them – their dysfunction, their loyalty. thought it was so fun to see everyone's distinct personalities (the rakish one, the violent one, the strong one, etc. etc.), how different they are and how they come together as one whole happy and chaotic family. just a bunch of brothers who love each other. and angus macpherson, the head of the family – the best and hottest (step)dad. I'm definitely eager to read the rest of the series, which follows each brother's individual story. (and hopefully angus' story too...?)
"We're like Highland thistles, you and I. Tough and stubborn. A mite hostile when we must be. Our nature doesnae suit everybody. But we grow where we've landed. We hold our ground. And we dinnae shrink from a fight, even when we're trampled. Ye ken?"
this was a fun, light-hearted romp (gosh I've wanted to use that phrase for ages) that covers a culture that was new to me in the historical romance realm. I enjoyed it!