Outlander [Paperback] Gabaldon, Diana

Review "Absorbing and heartwarming. . .lavishly evokes the land and lore of Scotland." —Publishers Weekly "Stunning!" —Los Angeles Daily News "It is a large canvas that Gabaldon paints, filled with strong passions and derring-do. Strong willed and sensual, Claire is an engaging modern heroine plopped down in a simpler, more primitive time. . . . Great fun . . . marvelous and fantastic adventures, romance, sex . . . perfect escape reading!" —San Francisco Chronicle Product Description Claire Randall is leading a double life. She has a husband in one century, and a lover in another... In 1945, Claire Randall, a former combat nurse, is back from the war and reunited with her husband on a second honeymoon—when she innocently touches a boulder in one of the ancient stone circles that dot the British Isles. Suddenly she is a Sassenach—an "outlander"—in a Scotland torn by war and raiding border clans in the year of our Lord...1743. Hurled back in time by forces she cannot understand, Claire's destiny in soon inextricably intertwined with Clan MacKenzie and the forbidden Castle Leoch. She is catapulted without warning into the intrigues of lairds and spies that may threaten her life...and shatter her heart. For here, James Fraser, a gallant young Scots warrior, shows her a passion so fierce and a love so absolute that Claire becomes a woman torn between fidelity and desire...and between two vastly different men in two irreconcilable lives. From the Back Cover "Absorbing and heartwarming...lavishly evokes the land and lore of Scotland." --Publishers Weekly "Stunning!" --Los Angeles Daily News "It is a large canvas that Gabaldon paints, filled with strong passions and derring-do. Strong willed and sensual, Claire is an engaging modern heroine plopped down in a simpler, more primitive time.... Great fun ...marvelous and fantastic adventures, romance, sex ...perfect escape reading!" --San Francisco Chronicle From the Trade Paperback edition. About the Author DIANA GABADLON is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the wildly popular Outlander novels, as well as the related Lord John Grey books,one work of nonfiction, and the Outlander graphic novel The Exile. She lives in Scottsdale, Arizona. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. Jamie made a fire in a sheltered spot, and sat down next to it. The rain had eased to a faint drizzle that misted the air and spangled my eyelashes with rainbows when I looked at the flames. He sat staring into the fire for a long time. Finally he looked up at me, hands clasped around his knees. "I said before that I'd not ask ye things ye had no wish to tell me. And I'd not ask ye now; but I must know, for your safety as well as mine." He paused, hesitating. "Claire, if you've never been honest wi' me, be so now, for I must know the truth. Claire, are ye a witch?" I gaped at him. "A witch? You—you can really ask that?" I thought he must be joking. He wasn't. He took me by the shoulders and gripped me hard, staring into my eyes as though willing me to answer him. "I must ask it, Claire! And you must tell me!" "And if I were?" I asked through dry lips. "If you had thought I were a witch? Would you still have fought for me?" "I would have gone to the stake with you!" he said violently. "And to hell beyond, if I must. But may the Lord Jesus have mercy on my soul and on yours, tell me the truth!" The strain of it all caught up with me. I tore myself out of his grasp and ran across the clearing. Not far, only to the edge of the trees; I could not bear the exposure of the open space. I clutched a tree; put my arms around it and dug my fingers hard into the bark, pressed my face to it and shrieked with hysterical laughter. Jamie's face, white and shocked, loomed up on the other side of the tree. With the dim realization that what I was doing must sound unnervingly like cackling, I made a terrific effort and stopped. Panting, I stared at him for a moment. "Yes," I said,