Taming the Highland Bride: A Highland Review

Yesterday I promised this review of Lynsay Sands Taming the Highland Bride. Merry Stewart is our fiery heroine and Alex d'Aumesbery is our dashing hero. It was a nice little read, it did lean on William Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew (Merry is called the Stewart Shrew, but I didn't see any shrew qualities to her).

Merry is a fun character who's family is a clan of drunkards, for the past six years she has virtually ran the clan while her father and two brothers drank themselves into stupors, she had always been engaged to Alex, however he was off at the war. He finally returns to England after the war and once Merry's family hears he's back they concoct a lie to take her to him for the wedding. Once they arrived, Alex is drunk as the dentist (who is also the blacksmith) had to pull a tooth. Merry is horrified as she thought she was leaving the evils of alcohol behind and now thinks her husband is also a drunkard.

I believe one of the funniest scenes in the book is the day after the wedding ceremony when they come for the sheets to prove Merry's "innocence", since her husband again appeared drunk he passed out, so Merry knew there had to be blood on the sheet, she cut her self on the thigh to give the blood but cut herself so badly that it looked like someone had been murdered on the sheet. The entire clan (including Alex) thought he had hurt her.

Well, someone is after Alex, trying to kill him in various ways, a fire, a falling boulder, etc. The truth of who it is isn't such a shock but the end was a little painful, I didn't like it. I thought it could have ended in a better way of course.

There are a couple in the series:

1.) Devil of the Highlands
2.) Taming the Highland Bride
3.) The Hellion and the Highlander

You can read excerpts of the stories on Lynsay Sands website. I've always been a fan of Lynsay Sands and it started with her debut novel The Deed, awesome wicked funny book!