Historical Romance
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Bride of Dunloch (Highland Loyalties Trilogy, Volume 1) by Veronica Bale @VeronicaBale1
Author Veronica Bale’s debut novel, Bride of Dunloch, is a gripping story of love and conflict in the time of the first Scottish War of Independence, and of one young girl’s struggle to determine for herself what is right and what is wrong.
In the watery grey light of a late spring dawn, two forces meet to oppose one another at the main gate of Dunloch Castle, an imposing structure nestled deep in the Scottish Highlands. On the attacking side are the MacGillivrays—a clan dispossessed of its ancestral lands and home because its members would not swear loyalty to the English King Edward the First. Dunloch is theirs, and they will take it back—by any means necessary.
So is the world in which Jane Sewell, a young and naive English girl of noble birth whose hand has been given away in marriage, finds herself. It is a land that is as bloody and brutal as it is beautiful. But when she stumbles upon a wounded Scottish warrior from the enemy MacGillivray clan, her compassionate nature will not allow her to abandon him. Against her better judgement, she resolves to help him in secret.
As tensions at Dunloch intensify, however, Jane finds herself torn between her duty—and her heart. For in these Scottish Highlands, loyalties can change as quickly as the weather …
Margaret of the North by EJourney @eholychair
Margaret is intelligent, independent-minded, and passionate about her own concerns. But how does she carve a niche and an identity for herself within the repressive constraints of Victorian society? This sequel to Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South takes off from the concluding scene in its retelling on the BBC miniseries. It is a Victorian feminist bildungsroman (coming-of-age novel) couched in romance.
Gaskell wrote Margaret Hale as a character blossoming into one who did not fit the mold of the typical woman of her time. She exudes a natural self-assurance and a brooding intelligence that butts itself against John Thornton, the virile alpha male who is, nevertheless, vulnerable.
Margaret of the North focuses on how Margaret whittles away at Victorian repression—both self-imposed or socially-dictated. She marries John Thornton and confronts not only her place in a rapidly changing society but also her growing awareness of her persona as a woman with compelling sexual, familial, and self-actualizing needs. One who wants a voice and makes a mark.
The romance is not only in the love between John and Margaret but also in the adventure and excitement Margaret undergoes as she discovers herself, a journey that happens quietly and mostly internally.
