Review: Fully earned every last star
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 05 24, 2014
COLLECTING ISOBELLE, third book in THE CURSE OF CLAN ROSS series, by L.L. Muir, is an exceptional example of time-travel romance.  It runs 203 pages (on my reader) without front- and end-matter...and I completely fell in.  To me, the inability to put down a book is a premium litmus test to the quality of the storyline, the pacing, the conflict, the pull of the characters....and this fine story did all of this!Like the rest of THE CURSE OF THE CLAN ROSS books, COLLECTING ISOBELLE is a Scottish Time-Travel Romance, uniting deserving characters who work darn hard to earn their happily-ever-afters.  I LOVED watching Isobelle Ross (who played a prominent role in GOING BACK FOR ROMEO) find her love-match in the most unlikely of men....Gaspar Dragotti ("sometimes called God's Dragon...Special Investigator to His Beatitude").  Watching Gaspar's character morph ever-so-believably from a tormented soul, lost behind the role and devotion to Church and God, find himself because of Isobelle's appearance in his life.  While Gaspar seems an unsympathetic character at the outset, we learn quickly that his motivations are so pure, his heart so good (while misguided, somewhat), that it's completely easy to fall in love with this character.  I found the tenderness and romance between Gaspar and Isobelle to be fiercely romantic.  And the dialogue!  It sparkled, warmed my romantic heart, and made me believe these two had genuinely fallen forever in the kind of love that will stand the test of time...and time travel.I LOVED this conclusion to a beloved trilogy.  It rocked!  The villain(s) were so very wicked, the good guys so very honorable, and the challenges the pair face on their way to happily-ever-after a joy to experience through Ms. Muir's exceptionally well-crafted and deep point of view characters.  Kudos to the author!Sensuality level: fiercely romantic while rated a gentle side of PGLanguage: G/PGHighly recommended to fans of historical romance (as the majority of this book is set in 1496, in Venice, Italy), fans of time-travel, fans of heart-grabbing tender romance (set in any time period at all).