Devil’s Highlander-Veronica Wolff

Devil’s Highlander
Veronica Wolff
Berkley, Aug 3 2010, $7.99
ISBN: 9780425236277

In 1660 Scotland following the defeat of the Scots, the MacAlpin clan returns home to Dunnottar. A war hero, Cormac MacAlpin remains traumatized though thirteen years have passed since his brother Aiden was abducted while the pair were playing in Aberdeen. His best friend Marjorie Keith was with the brothers when the tragedy occurred and has since become an angel to the impoverished youth of the city.

When another child is snatched from the city’s streets, Marjorie begs Cormac the reclusive fisherman to save the kid. However, he remains immobile by shame and self-pity. She refuses to accept inertia from her beloved. Instead she keeps pressuring him to join her on an investigation into who is kidnapping children off the streets of Aberdeen or she will go it alone.

This is a wonderful seventeenth century Highlander romance starring a tormented reluctant hero who blames himself for what happened to his twin though he could do nothing to prevent the kidnapping and the angel who demands he save the latest victim. The story line is at its best when the focus is on 1660; the plot slightly decelerates when it centers on the lead couple’s traumatized look back to the tragic event of 1647 though that adds enormous realism as the snatching of Aiden made Cormac and Marjorie what they are as adults. Fans will appreciate Veronica Wolfe’s latest Highlander romance wondering what became of Aiden.

Harriet Klausner