Welcome back to Cousin Allison, a guest reviewer. Since she reads historical romances and I don’t, she gets roped into reviewing once in a while. Today she’s talking ranting about Highland Master by Hannah Howell. Just so you know, there will be spoilers, so consider yourselves warned! ~Lynda
Where to start with this review…Let me first say that I normally LOVE all Hannah Howell books and have no problem reading them in order/out of order or even just sections of the books. They always grab my attention and I fall in with the story. With Highland Master that was not the case with this book!
WARNING RANT/SPOILERS AHEAD!!!!
At the beginning of the story you meet Triona McKee when she is struggling with keeping her home and people safe, fed, and housed while dealing with a nasty neighbor. Then before you can even really get a grasp of the situation Triona’s cousin Arianna MacFingal shows up with some of her family/in-laws (as her escort) as she is running away from her own marriage (WTH?)!! This new second story within the book was so distracting that I stopped reading the book! I then told myself it had to get better so I started again; I did this about 3 times! It didn’t get much better. The book should have been called Highland Avenger II as a follow-up book to Arianna and Brian’s book as that story was more than half this book and completely distracting from what shod have been Triona and Brett’s story.
I honestly can’t write a good review for this book because I was so annoyed with the second story taking over that I had to force my way through this book just so I could get it finished so I could re-read Highland Avenger because I needed to know if that book really ended how I remembered and if the other “new” storyline for those characters really fit in with what had been written about them. Yes I know I could have just stopped and read Highland Avenger first, but that isn’t the point. In the past these books have always been stand alone books with characters who make appearances in other stories, but this seemed like it was just an extended epilogue of a previous book.
So after I read Highland Avenger again I don’t think we needed this whole drama of Brian being married before Ariana to come out. It has no significance, and they have taken her prior marriage to another level of problems when we already knew it was a mess from HER book.
I really wanted more for Triona and Brett. I wanted to see more interaction between the characters and how they intertwined with Triona’s people who see her as the leader not some guy who is stepping in to help out.
Maybe the next Hannah Howell book will restore my faith in her, but I sure hope I won’t be required to read Highland Master again to make sure I’m ready for what may be the sequel to this disaster of a book.
Cousin Allison
Guest Reviewer Extraordinaire
RATING: 1.5 Stars