Review: One non-historical mess- spoilers
Rating: 1 out of 5
Date: 03 16, 2014
I bought this as a part of the 7-book box set, but am reviewing it here because it was so awful. Gillian is 24, and touring England in lieu of a honeymoon (for reasons unclear, her wedding didn't take place). Threatened by a gang of thugs, she runs into a cemetery and is transported back to the year 1260. Now, I enjoy this genre when well done, but apparently the author decided that including accurate historical details was immaterial. A few examples:1. The heroine goes on for pages assuming that someone has gone to the huge expense of re-creating the castle she was sketching as ruins, as a fully-functioning and populated castle, all as some sort of practical joke on her. No explanation of why anyone would spend millions to do so. Finally, she concludes that it's time travel, and what does she do? Does she panic at the idea of being trapped 750 years in the past? No, she assumes that somehow, she'll get home again, but she might as well enjoy a vacation while she's there.2. She has a backpack full of modern items, and arrives wearing shorts. The medieval ladies conclude her shorts are a chastity belt, because they have a zipper. That is, a zipper would deter any potential rapist, even though the ladies figure out how it works, and the shorts are so tight no rapist would be able to cut them off her. Seriously? A medieval rapist is so delicate that he wouldn't use a knife for fear of cutting his victim?3. Despite this odd pack, everyone seems to respect Gillian's privacy and not search it. Or, at any rate, if they search it, no one touches the touchscreen of her cell phone, which is still working. They express no curiosity about the strange objects she has.4. Gillian makes no efforts, even after concluding she's in 1260, to avoid 21st century language. And the medieval folk understand her! She repeatedly uses 'OK', and they seem to know what she means by that. Nor do they inquire about what a 'biological clock' is. A brief trip through Wikipedia would have told the author that in 1260, residents of a remote castle on the Scots border were likely to be unfamiliar with the concept of 'clock' itself.5. Despite having resolved to never trust a woman again, Kellen falls in adoration of Gillian in a week or so.Despite having wondered if she were a spy, he doesn't send to the castle of her supposed father, to inquire why his bride arrived 5 weeks early all alone. Despite being a medieval man, he's amused by her arguing with him, and knuckles under when she defies his orders.6. Everyone thinks she's charming, not a madwoman, even though she has none of the traditional skills of a noblewoman.7. No one marvels that she has that extremely expensive item, paper. Nor that she has had enough paper to be able to develop skill at sketching. For that matter, no one marvels that the grade of paper she has is vastly superior to that available elsewhere in the era.8. Many of the details, from her abilities at sketching to her donning a billowy white nightgown, are more typical of Victorian heroines rather than medieval. A servant begs her for 'the latest fashions' from London, as if the daughter of a border knight would be at court, and as if women in remote areas aped the garments of the queen. You wore what you had. You didn't aim to sew feathers to your gowns because the Queen did. If she did. Again, our friend Wikipedia talks about her being a leader of fashion, but nothing about feathers. Although this might be to poke fun at Gillian's lack of knowledge about the era, but why? Why not just have Gillian reach back into her college education and remember a history course? Could it be because the author is disinterested in getting the historical details right, herself, and unwilling to take the effort to even consult Wikipedia? Perhaps, because after all this concern about the latest fashion, Gillian's dresses are left undescribed except for the color. If fashion doesn't matter enough for you to actually know what a gown would look like in 1260, why make a big point about fashion?9. Servants can tell her it's the year 1260. Even in an era when people might not know the year of their own birth. Gillian does not instantly know who's king then...but when told it's Henry, she sees this as supporting proof of the correctness of the year. Never mind that she's portrayed as being so historically naive, she doesn't mistake the Henry and Eleanor of 1260 from the couple of 1160.10. Gillian compares the picture on her cell phone of the rock where she was sitting prior to her transit, to the rock in 1260, discovers it's a precise match. Now, never mind why one would take a picture of a rock. But in 750 years, neither the forces of nature nor those of mankind have altered the rock in any way? No erosion? It wasn't chipped away at for use in whatever war engines turned the castle into ruins? No one applied a little dynamite (after it was invented)?So, there are 10 observations of why this novel is a non-historical mess. Everyone meets Gillian and instead of considering her odd to the point of madness, they wistfully wish they were her and find her utterly charming and alluring. Why? Because they do. They don't seem to notice her rudeness, her whining, her total self-absorption. She makes no efforts to fit in, to use words familiar to them- in fact, she seems to go out of her way to use 20th century (not even 21st century) idioms like 'kiddo'. At one point, there's both children and goats, and I was confused as to which she meant by 'kids'...but her medieval companions instantly understand.I won't be wasting any money on this author's ill-written and completely unresearched books.