Lord John and the Private Matter
113. Lord John and the Private Matter by Diana Gabaldon (Historical Mystery) 301 p.
Much, much better than I expected. I’m interested in the Outlander series because I know a lot of people love it, but I’ve been put off by the number of things in it that I don’t enjoy reading about (particularly the time travel.) Still, no one seems to doubt that Diana Gabaldon is a good writer, so I picked up a copy of Lord John and the Private Matter at a book sale a couple of weeks ago.
Lord John is a minor character from the Outlander series, apparently. Back in London after his exile in Scotland, Lord John has rejoined his army regiment, waiting to find out where they will be sent next. It is 1757, and there is no shortage of possibilities. Before they get their orders, however, Lord John has the misfortune to witness something shocking: the troubling evidence that Joseph Trevelyan, his cousin’s fiancé, is suffering from syphilis. On the heels of that discovery, he is asked to look into the mysterious death of one of the regiment’s enlisted men, a man who may have been guilty of treason.
Plenty of people have commented on Gabaldon’s impeccable research into the time periods she writes about, and that’s something I find very attractive in a historical novel. More so in this case, because there aren’t many fictional depictions of London’s gay community in the 18th century.
I liked Lord John, although I wish he wasn’t in in love with Jamie Fraser (the hero of Outlander and its sequels). I suppose she didn’t have much of a choice (since she’d already written him that way), but it isn’t an interesting plot thread for anyone who hasn’t read her other series. I would love to see Lord John in a relationship with someone else, but somehow I don’t think that will happen anytime soon (although I’d be delighted to be proven wrong!)
The book focuses mainly on the mystery plot, and anything we get of Lord John’s internal life comes from the thoughts and emotions arising from the events of the book. This isn’t a bad way of writing him, but it makes him somewhat difficult to get to know, especially since he’s rather introverted and there’s no one particularly close to him among his friends and family, so we never see how he acts when he’s truly at ease with anyone.
I will be keeping my eye out for the sequel, Lord John and the Brotherhood of the Blade.
113a. “Lord John and the Hellfire Club” by Diana Gabaldon (Historical Mystery, Short Story) 42 p.
My edition contains two special bonuses: an excerpt from the latest Outlander novel, A Breath of Snow and Ashes (judging by which, I will never pick up any of the books in that series), and Gabaldon’s first (and at that time, only) short story, “Lord John and the Hellfire Club”. Gabaldon wrote this for an anthology which had a strict word limit, which she says is the only reason she was able to produce such a short piece. Short stories are clearly not her medium. The plot is far too complex for the length of the story, and it reads a bit like a novel with a lot of the characterization, description, and plot development left out. Things happen, but there’s not enough space in the text to really explore them. It isn’t a bad short story, but it’s one that should have been a novel, or at least a novella.
I’ll still read her other short stories (she has a collection of Lord John short stories coming out in November, which includes this one), but I wouldn’t recommend that anyone judge her talent by them, as they’re clearly inferior to her novels.
Books read: 113
Pages read: 33,586
Tags: 50 Book Challenge 2007, Diana Gabaldon, Lord John Grey, Unread Authors Challenge
