Veronica Wolff will delight Highlander fans with this highly enjoyable, action-packed romance and a hero to die for!

Devil’s Highlander begins a new saga, Clan MacAlpin, for author Veronica Wolff. And an exciting series launch it is! From the first page to the last, I was completely swept away by this book and enjoyed every moment lost in Cormac and Marjorie’s tale.

The best thing about this book is hands-down the hero, Cormac MacAlpin. The tragic kidnapping of his twin brother, Aidan, shapes him into a tortured man, a child warrior who goes to war for Scotland too early and pays the spiritual consequences for it as an adult. A hardened man who carries the physical scars and the emotional toil of his years at war, Cormac is a man of the sea. His character is well-motivated and romance fans are sure to love this honorable alpha who tries his best not to be the alpha but fails miserably when childhood sweetheart, Marjorie Keith, charges back into his life:

The man jerked his head to the end of the dock. “Move along, you.”

“Move along?” Cormac asked placidly, shifting a blank-eyed gaze to the man. Making his body loose, he casually reached behind him, to the dagger he kept tucked in the small of his back. It was long for throwing, but he’d no other choice. Besides, he was confident fury would guide his aim. “Aye, I’ll move along.”

Cormac’s slackened muscles hardened in an instant, and his arm lashed out, his blade landing with a dull suck into the flesh of the man’s shoulder. “But I’ll take my woman with me,” he said with utter serenity.

I was a little slower to warm up to Marjorie’s character. A witness to Aidan’s kidnapping, she too carries a lot of blame for the event into her adult life, remaining a spinster and caring for orphaned boys in Aberdeen. It didn’t make as much sense to me that she would be as driven to guilt so many years later as Cormac, but otherwise she is a fresh blend of vulnerability and boldness. Despite the blame she lays on herself, she is a plucky, take-charge heroine who plunges right into the heart of danger, armed and ready, particularly with Cormac, her lost love and champion, at her side. The story is well-paced, a page-turner in both swashbuckling action and tender romance. The touches of humor make it all the more enjoyable, going hand in hand with the adventure and sizzling sensuality:

Cormac’s eyes grazed up her spine, and his body quickened at once. He’d been so busy practiced his damned focus, paying mind only to the endless series of ties, he hadn’t realized her sleeves had slipped low and her gown gaped open at her back.

“You’ve got that big, long sword, Cormac.”

He coughed. Sword indeed.

Stories of reunion and long-lost loves are inherently tender, but Cormac and Marjorie’s redemption is especially so. Their passion flames off the page and delivers the best first kiss scene I’ve read in years:

Marjorie felt something, a shift in the air around her. It made her turn.

Cormac strode to her. Intent darkened his face. He was power and conviction and anguish, too.

He came to her in anger. He came to berate her and belittle her. Pride sputtered up from someplace down deep. Marjorie stiffened her back, bracing for his attack. “If you’ve come to—”

Cormac slammed into her, crushing her body close to his, and his mouth stole the words from her lips. Wrapping an arm at her back, tangling a hand in her hair, Cormac kiss her, roughly, deeply, his mouth hard and hungry. She let her head fall back, feeling her heels leave the sand as he pulled her up and into him. She’d been gripping the sides of her cloak tightly, but her hands slackened. She let go, her arms stretched down and out at her sides, as though poised to feel a storm’s wind rush over her body.

I felt that Devil’s Highlander is also a unique tale, a departure from the usual Highlander romance setting and plotline. Amidst the well-researched streets and docks of Aberdeen, the book takes on weighty issues likes human bondage and child labor as well as explores the depths to which guilt and blame can destroy lives. I look forward to the next story in the Clan MacAlpin saga. Meanwhile, Devil’s Highlander has all the right ingredients for a must-read historical romance! ~ Amber Leigh