Novel of the week Marianka Swain
GO TELL THE BEES THAT I AM GONE
by Diana Gabaldon
Eager viewers of the TV adaptation of Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander novels have termed the 18-month wait between seasons “Droughtlander”. Well, readers are surely gasping: it’s been seven years since the last volume in her historical fantasy series. Their reward is a book aimed squarely at aficionados. Numerous characters re-emerge, past dramas are rehashed, and there are long-awaited revelations that will satisfy devotees, though likely baffle anyone else.
However, even diehard fans may question why the first few hundred pages are spent on an extended family reunion as time-travelling doctor Claire and her hunky 18th-century Highlander husband Jamie Fraser resettle in North Carolina with their sprawling clan. Gabaldon is a gifted world-builder, and her attention to the unglamorous details of life in the past, like digging privies, plus authentic portraits of relationships, lift her series above the usual bodicerippers – even if our now middleaged central couple do have remarkably impressive sex drives.
After an ominous prologue and constant talk of conflict (we begin in 1779, during the American Revolutionary War), you long for more action. Eventually, we do encounter real battles and historical figures – although the latter can’t match up to previous cameos from George Washington and Bonnie Prince Charlie – but Gabaldon’s main characters are seldom key participants. It’s particularly frustrating that the spirited Claire is so often confined to a domestic or observer role.
The most poignant theme is the way friends and family are divided by their loyalist or patriot sympathies. We also get a further glimmer of supernatural forces at work, juxtaposed with jostling religions: Presbyterian, Catholic and Quaker. But this episodic epic is really just another chapter in the ongoing saga, rather than a distinct novel. And that may suit Outlander fans just fine.