Review: Highlander's Folly

The Highlander's Folly (Loch Moigh #3)

by Barbara Longley

Blurb:

A brave fifteenth-century Highlander fiercely devoted to his foster family, Hunter of clan MacKintosh can defeat any man in battle. Thanks to his Fae gifts, he can read the intent of his opponents and guess their next moves. But when the faerie Madame Giselle sends Hunter to the present day, he stumbles into a staged battle and rescues a young knight—only to discover that the knight is a woman, and she’s anything but a damsel in distress.

Meghan McGladrey learned martial arts and sword fighting from her father, a time-traveling Highlander himself. To Hunter’s surprise, Meghan is as skilled as any knight. When both of them are pulled back to the fifteenth century, Meghan becomes desperate to return to her time. Hunter, who is pledged to another, begins to fall for the beautiful, brave warrior as they fight side by side against a common enemy. Now, he must decide which matters more: his honor, or following his heart.

Themes: time travel, magick, historical

Rating: 4 stars

Heat Rating:

Review:

Returning to the lands of magick and mayhem, where the Fae are just as likely to help you as they are to turn your life completely upside down, Highlander’s Folly was another great addition to a series that has personally captured my attention and imagination and one that I find myself dying for every time a new story releases.  Longley’s writing, characters, and richly detailed stories are enough to capture the hearts of any romance reader, whether you prefer paranormal, historical or contemporary, because each story gives you a little of each subgenre, meshed together magically and with the heart to bring you back to the basics of love.  Until this series, I have only ever read one other series about time travel I was really able to get in to, but Loch Moigh is so well done that I can’t resist returning to learn more about these awesome and magical characters.  Hunter and Meghan were both great characters and so perfectly matched, even when he was being bullheaded and I just knew that if they could find a way they would have a long and happy life together, in whatever century they ended up living in.  If you have missed the previous stories in the series, you will miss out on a lot of the subtext, but there is enough information that you can follow along, though my recommendation is, you go back to the beginning and read the entire trilogy, of course.  In the meantime, Hunter and Meghan’s adventure as they fall in love and deal with the differences in their cultures is enough to keep you enthralled, never fear on that point.

Hunter has been a favorite character of mine since book one, when he was just a scraggly little guy stealing the heart of a displaced 21^st century woman and the highland laird that she falls in love with.  His story was not exactly an easy one, but he grew into a great man and one that has many important qualities, not the least of which is his honor and dedication to keeping promises.  But his hard head and stubborn adherence to some promises keep him from accepting the gift of love right in front of him, determined that he and Meghan cannot be together because of a promise made almost two decades earlier in a moment of weakness.  Other than that, it is obvious he is a good man, sexy, sweet and willing to sacrifice for even a stranger if it is the right thing to do, and Meghan is his one vulnerability, even as she makes him stronger.  Meghan has been pulled from everything and almost everyone she knows, thrust into the past and forced to deal with the antiquated beliefs of men and their treatment of women.  Despite all that though she holds her own, defending herself and those around her, and earns the esteem of Hunter and his men with her skills and intelligence—not to mention her beauty.  She is immediately attracted to Hunter, despite him basically kidnapping her, and tries to fight that attraction as much as possible.  When they both begin to give in to their attraction, however, she begins to hope there might be a chance for them to have a future, even though she misses her family and plans to return to them.  Being around Hunter as he chases another woman was never part of her plan though.  Meghan handles the hurdles thrown her way very well, even though Hunter often disregards her emotions, leaving her heartbroken, and her own stubbornness keeps her from allowing him to see just how badly he hurts her.  Essentially, she is a woman well before her time, a warrior in every sense of the word, and something that the men of medieval Scotland are very unprepared for—which I LOVED. 

All in all Highlander’s Folly led you down a road of discovery, healing hurts, and overcoming vulnerabilities to bring together two perfectly flawed, but perfectly matched individuals in a love for the ages, one that transcends all barriers of time, space, and culture.  Hunter has some surprising changes occur in his life, beyond losing his heart to a 21st-century woman, and watching him grow and deal with those issues was magical.  Though he was pigheaded and blind at times to the havoc he wreaked on the women in his life, I think that was more of the ingrained obliviousness that accompanies most male brains.  Meghan was a woman after my own heart, one of those women I want to grow up to be.  She was kick-ass but still sweet, loving, intelligent, and quick-witted, not to mention sarcastic at just the right moments.  Seeing her fall in love with Hunter and get her heart battered and bruised again and again was difficult, but when he finally sees reason and embraces their love, I knew they would be together forever.  We got to see many past characters all grown up and with families of their own, even getting  a glimpse of the future generations of these partially Fae individuals that may or may not find a way to travel to the future to find their mates.  I’m really hoping this wasn’t the final story in the series and we get to see some more sensual and outrageous pairings over the ages.  Keep the stories coming Barbara and I’ll keep spreading the world about your skills and awesomeness. 

*eARC provided by publisher (via netgalley) for the purpose of an honest and unbiased review.  No compensation was provided.