Voyager

November 29, 1993
In this triumphant conclusion to the time-travel trilogy she began with Outlander , Gabaldon continues the saga of 20th-century physician Claire Randall and 18th-century Jacobite rebel Jamie Fraser. The first quarter of this mammoth novel covers, in alternate sections, the 20 years the couple spends apart. Jamie is imprisoned, then pardoned and finally sets up shop as a (seditious) printer. Believing that Jamie died at Culloden, the pregnant Claire returns to her own century, reunites (unhappily) with her first husband and gives birth to a daughter, Brianna. But when Claire takes Brianna to Scotland in 1968 to introduce her to her true heritage, they uncover evidence that Jamie had survived. Claire determines she must rejoin him and once again steps fatefully through the stones on Craigh na Dun to find Jamie in Edinburgh in 1766. They wish nothing more than to lead a quiet life, but the kidnapping by pirates of Jamie's young nephew sets the couple off to the New World in pursuit, followed by old enemies and faced by new and vicious dangers. Gabaldon adroitly shepherds her protagonists through the eternal misunderstandings of the sexes, as well as those due to the different epochs in which they were born. Although this latest volume lacks some of the scope and grandeur of the previous two, her use of historical detail and a truly adult love story confirm Gabaldon as a superior writer of historical romance. Literary Guild main selection; author tour.

December 1, 1993
More than 20 years after her trip to 18th-century Scotland, Claire Randall, now a doctor and the mother of a daughter fathered by a man from the distant past, seeks to return in search of her beloved, who is thought lost in the Battle of Culloden in 1748. Continuing the story begun in Outlander ( LJ 7/91) and Dragonfly in Amber ( LJ 7/92), Gabaldon weaves a rich historical romance with fantasy underpinnings out of one of history's most celebrated lost causes. Sure to be popular with fans of lusty romance, this saga of time-traveling lovers may also attract a fantasy audience.

Copyright 1993 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

November 15, 1993
The third of Gabaldon's novels featuring the time-traveling heroine Claire Randall covers her reunion with her twentieth-century husband, the birth of her daughter by eighteenth-century Scots clansman Jamie Fraser, and her training as a doctor. In due course, she feels driven to essay time traveling again, but reunion with Jamie takes place on the eve of Culloden. The pair's subsequent flight for life takes them to the West Indies and, finally, to a hair-raising shipwreck in the American colonies that hints there may be a fourth volume of Claire's adventures. Gabaldon handles the time-travel elements competently but subordinates them to classic historical romance--a big one, luxuriantly detailed and featuring highly appealing characters and an authentic feel to the background that speaks well of her research and writing. Recommended wherever "Outlander" and "A Dragonfly in Amber" found an audience. ((Reviewed Nov. 15, 1993))(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 1993, American Library Association.)