“The Outlander”, by Gil Adamson

Adamson, Gil. The Outlander: a Novel. New York: Ecco, 2008. Print.

I have the feeling this book was recommended to me my LibraryThing, not because of books I’ve read, but books that are on my “to read someday” list. However, it popped up on my library hold list and I figured it was about what I was looking for.

It was indeed… a historical setting, a sympathetic main character, exciting adventures, and memorable supporting characters. I have been struggling lately knowing how much to say in these “reviews”, since the point is to keep track of what I might want to be searching for later, but I don’t want to include spoilers.

So, I’ll try to describe a bit here, without giving anything away.  Mary is a young widow, just 19, whose only child died within a few days of being born. She suffers from mental illness (schizophrenia, I guess, considering that she sees visions and hears voices?) and murders her husband. At the beginning of the book she is running away, pursued by her brothers-in-law, two very similar looking large, red-headed men. William Moreland is a loner she runs across and spends time with in the wilderness of 1903 Western Canada. There’s a mining town and a dwarf, and I suppose you could label this a “Western”, but trying to pigeonhole it in that way would be a shame.