From lust to love in The Wrong Highlander

00;00;03;29 - 00;00;27;09
Leonora
Hello, ladies. You're listening to A Fancy for Romance podcast. A podcast for historical romance fiction lovers. And I'm your host, Leonora, a fellow fan. This is episode two from Lost to Love, and we're going to be diving into The Wrong Highlander by Lynsay Sands. Before we begin, I don't use character names, so you will mostly be hearing female lead and male lead.

00;00;27;21 - 00;00;35;23
Leonora
There will be the occasional spoiler, but nothing that will ruin it if you haven't read the novel. Without further ado, let's get to it. 

00;00;35;23 - 00;00;49;19
Leonora
Female leads father is sick and she is worried he's going to die. Luckily, she has heard of the famous healer that is said to work wonders. So she takes her father's right hand man and her cousin to search for the healer and hire him.

00;00;50;05 - 00;01;12;16
Leonora
After two days of riding hard. She finally comes across the healer. But it turns out that he is in a waterfall bathing. So she sends her cousin in to fetch him. Now here is the caveat. The man who is bathing is not the healer, but is actually the healer brother male lead. So the female lead is approaching the wrong person.

00;01;12;29 - 00;01;35;20
Leonora
Things escalate quickly and with reason because being approached while naked and bathing is not cool. So the two men get into a skirmish. And before the male lead drowns her cousin, our female lead knocks him out cold and ends up inadvertently kidnaping him because she's in a hurry to get back to her father. Little does she know that she is taking the wrong person.

00;01;36;07 - 00;01;54;12
Leonora
So here we are starting a story where the female lead kidnaps the male lead yall. And when I read the summary in the back of the book, call me intrigued. I just had to read it. I want to know how are they going to make the relationship work? It essentially started with the kidnaping and this whole conundrum was started by our female lead.

00;01;54;14 - 00;02;07;01
Leonora
So we're looking at a kidnaping trope, but reverse kidnaping in this case. So I thought, let's dove into this. Why not? I want to know how they're going to fall in love.

00;02;07;01 - 00;02;21;19
Leonora
Things escalate quickly in the wrong Highlander, going from 0 to 100 on various occasions, like the waterfall scene and their first kiss. The scenes escalate in comical ways most of the time because of the character's inability to think before they act.

00;02;22;02 - 00;02;40;15
Leonora
Which gave me second hand embarrassment and a good giggle on multiple occasions. In my mind, I am like, Okay, we're going to have a badass female lead. She's going to be strong willed she can handle her own in a fight. And she is, however, in a stubborn kind of way, which sets the tone for our female lead.

00;02;40;24 - 00;03;01;11
Leonora
She acts before she thinks. That is not to say that she is an uninteresting character, though she can get a bit annoying. She was forced to grow up quickly, so she takes charge of things and does them in her own way, which is commendable. She loves her home and the people in it through and through. She is an independent woman who loves her freedom and taking charge.

00;03;01;18 - 00;03;20;01
Leonora
This is cool to read in the historical romance genre because we are aware of how hard it was to be a woman at the time. Most of these qualities stem from the relationship she has with her father, which while reading, you can quickly realize she's got some daddy issues. In short, their relationship was complicated because he was not always present in her life.

00;03;20;02 - 00;03;41;00
Leonora
However, despite the lack of involvement from her father, she still loved him. The story starts with the fact that she does not want him to die and is looking for a way to save his life. This complicated relationship with her father was rather interesting because it was not a clean cut, good or bad. In reality, people are complicated and their father daughter relationship is complicated, which is pretty realistic.

00;03;42;04 - 00;04;05;12
Leonora
Our male lead in this story fits into the good guy mold. He's the middle child. He loves to help out his family with their duties and is seen doing so in his first appearance. As a middle child he doesn't expect much as it was custom at the time for them not to have much. He does not have any major character flaw that holds him back and is generally well-liked by those around him, making him overall a well-liked character.

00;04;05;15 - 00;04;20;14
Leonora
As I was reading, I thought that he contrasts nicely with the female lead, where he has a large, loving and supportive family. She does not. She is the head of her family and he is not. These were nice, subtle contrasts that I think played nicely for both characters.

00;04;20;14 - 00;04;33;28
Leonora
Male Lead has the standard roguish Highlander charm, but what I found interesting in his character was that he is pretty self-conscious about being a jack of all trades and not particularly a master at any skill.

00;04;33;29 - 00;04;54;29
Leonora
Having multiple skills in this way is very relatable and him having insecurities about it is also very human because otherwise he would be perfect and we can't have that. The way he interacted with his family in the story and how his family supported him was enjoyable to read overall. It should be noted that the male lead character is not prone to a temper.

00;04;55;01 - 00;05;01;18
Leonora
This can be seen through how he handles the kidnaping and how he interacts with all the other characters involved.

00;05;01;18 - 00;05;15;19
Leonora
But first, kidnaping. As I read, I quickly realized the whole kidnaping thing is just the method used for the characters to meet each other. It was a trope used quickly to get the story going. It's not actually the main plot kind of acting as a story hook.

00;05;15;21 - 00;05;22;26
Leonora
So if the whole kidnaping thing makes you a double take, this is not a dark story by any means. And if you were hoping for something darker, this ain’t it my friend.

00;05;22;26 - 00;05;30;22
Leonora
The kidnaping was explained away in a far fetched manner and our male lead totally supports the reasoning and argues against it being a kidnaping in the first place.

00;05;30;22 - 00;05;47;25
Leonora
It's kind of swept under the rug and downplayed, so to speak. As a reader, I just kept thinking this is an interesting story to tell your kids one day “When I met your mom, she knocked me out cold, thinking I was your uncle.” All in all, the trope was again downplayed and not something I want to spend much time on.

00;05;47;25 - 00;06;08;06
Leonora
Even though it was initially what caught my attention the way it was downplayed and swept under a rug was kind of a letdown, to be honest. In fact, as I was reading, I found something far more interesting that kept me engaged, which is that the author takes our characters from lust to love instead. This leads to an unexpected character, self-awareness in the story.

00;06;08;12 - 00;06;28;13
Leonora
This took me by surprise because the author does not try to pass off their shenanigans as love at first sight. Mind you, while reading, the characters can be comically impulsive, so for them to have moments of inward thinking was nice. Page 73 has a nice moment where she is questioning how she can lust after someone she barely knew.

00;06;28;13 - 00;06;56;07
Leonora
And page 256 shows her mulling over what she thinks of him and if she is willing to marry him. She is not deluding herself that she loves him, but she is weighing her options. I particularly like the sentence and I quote “It was the talking that had slowly begun to change her mind”, which I feel shows the importance of quality, time and communication in a relationship and on page 276, we can see male lead openly questioning his feelings for her.

00;06;56;08 - 00;07;20;11
Leonora
So even though both characters are pretty impulsive, it is these small moments in the writing that made it an enjoyable reading experience. Both female and male lead knew from the get go they were sexually attracted to one another and didn't bother trying to mask it as love. Their first kiss was intense with bumping and grinding on a bed with her unconscious father in the room, which had me thinking REALLY?

00;07;20;14 - 00;07;34;14
Leonora
But anyway, the scene straight up depicts lust. They barely knew each other. Heck, to that point they had barely spoken. So to have written fluff about how they fell in love at first sight would have been absurd. And I appreciate the author calling it out.

00;07;34;14 - 00;07;45;15
Leonora
As a whole this aspect of the story was far more interesting to me because it made me want to know how they were going to come to terms with their feelings and how exactly were they going to fall in love.

00;07;45;19 - 00;08;06;14
Leonora
There are a total of five intimate scenes, only two where they do the deed. Even though five intimate scenes could arguably feel like a lot. Two of them are motivated by the characters wanting to become closer to each other and further explore each other intimately. The male and female lead acknowledge their feelings as lust and throughout the story, work to progress into love.

00;08;06;14 - 00;08;24;13
Leonora
Does the lust to love happen quickly? I would argue yes, it does. It takes this family about two weeks to get to her key, and that's the amount of time we get for them to decide whether they like each other or not. So it all happens pretty quickly. I do acknowledge, however, that the author only has a little over 300 pages to work magic with.

00;08;24;16 - 00;08;45;20
Leonora
So the fact that she incorporates scenes where the characters are getting to know each other as well as adding character exposition where they contemplate their own feelings, allows you to feel like they have more time together than they actually have. So while I do feel in relation to reality, it's too fast to fall in love and two weeks in the bounds of the story.

00;08;45;20 - 00;08;54;28
Leonora
It kind of works because we need these characters to fall in love within this 300 page limit. And she gives us enough scenes to believe that it happened.

00;08;54;28 - 00;09;09;28
Leonora
Now the author messed with my feelings while reading. The last bed scene was romantic, but I could not get over the fact that they were injured. I couldn't help thinking, but you're hurt though. Like you guys are recovering. But I digress.

00;09;09;28 - 00;09;22;08
Leonora
All in all, I appreciate the acknowledgment that love and lust are two totally different things. The fact that the characters straight up question their feelings for each other and outright say they know they are not in love was refreshing.

00;09;22;08 - 00;09;30;17
Leonora
Now something I am forever googling how to pronounce. Every time I read a Highlander historical romance is Sgian-dubh.

00;09;30;23 - 00;09;51;04
Leonora
Not only is this word tough to pronounce, but it's quite common in the genre because it was historically such a useful everyday tool. The Sgian-dubh is a small, versatile blade used for eating and preparing food, hunting and even protection. Basically, think of it as a knife you carried around in case you needed to cut something.

00;09;51;04 - 00;10;12;16
Leonora
The word rushes popped up a few times in the story and with a bit of perusal on Google, I found that rushes are, in essence, a type of plant laid on the floor for both insulation as well as scent, because herbs would sometimes be added a kind of acts as an affordable carpet, so to speak, and would be changed for the benefit of guests.

00;10;12;16 - 00;10;34;03
Leonora
Lastly, I would like to touch on riding a horse side saddle. The reason being that this is imposed on women in history for the sake of modesty. Now, for a long time, every time I read a historical romance, just imagining riding a horse side saddle felt. Ridiculous. But that's it. It only went as far as my imagination could take me.

00;10;34;04 - 00;10;53;14
Leonora
But last year, I was actually lucky enough to actually ride a horse up a hill. So as the inexperienced rider that I am, I realized riding a horse is incredibly difficult. Riding astride is difficult. So experiencing what it's like to be on a horse. I have a newfound respect for the women who had to learn how to do so side saddle.

00;10;53;14 - 00;11;04;16
Leonora
I can also kind of relate to why Highland Vixen type of characters would dislike it so much because with my modest experience, being on a horse takes effort even astride.

00;11;04;16 - 00;11;27;16
Leonora
This got me curious, though, how could a woman actually ride side saddle comfortably? It turns out that throughout history, the side saddle itself has been adjusted various times to make riding easier, starting from a simple chair like construction in the 14th century, continuously being modified to the introduction of an extra pommel and then reaching the riding form we are familiar with today in the Victorian era.

00;11;27;17 - 00;11;43;20
Leonora
It's crazy to think on how long it would take to find a way where women could ride comfortably all for the sake of modesty, as a counterpoint, though, it's also amazing to see that by adjusting the side saddle itself, women were able to discover a form where they could gallop comfortably.

00;11;43;21 - 00;12;02;12
Leonora
Trust me, riding in a simple walk astride is hard and scary for a complete novice. So the thought of writing a gallop side saddle is beyond me. All in all, I find the history of it fascinating because riding a horse is hard, but also a bit frustrating. The women were imposed that these things are simply for modesty. It's ridiculous.

00;12;02;16 - 00;12;23;04
Leonora
This, of course, coming from modern sensibilities, where it is understood that a woman's hymen is not indicative of her virginity and that some women are even born without them. But again, I digress. The fact that a side saddle was able to be adjusted to the point where one could gallop feels like a silent protest, one which says. This restriction will not hold me back.

00;12;23;12 - 00;12;42;27
Leonora
Reading the wrong Highlander was a fun experience. The story explores the complexities of love and lust in a comical, lighthearted kind of way. For me, it was an easy binge read, full of giggles and snorts. And this brings us to the end of A Fancy For Romance. Episode two from Lust to Love. Thank you so much for listening to the end.

00;12;43;03 - 00;12;51;07
Leonora
I appreciate it so much. Don’t forget to subscribe to our podcast and share with your friends who love historical romance. See you next time.