Outlander by Diana Gabaldon

Well, I read almost 400 pages, that is. Then I finally threw in the towel and gave up. I don't understand the fascination with Gabaldon's Outlander series. I never felt any great romance between Claire and Frank (her hubby in the here-and-now). In fact, she seemed rather bored with him at the beginning of the book. And while I did like Jaime, again, I didn't feel like it was a great romance, more two characters brought together by circumstances who happen to have some chemistry.

Bigger problems for me with the time-travel aspect. Why, oh why, doesn't Claire freak out more when she suddenly finds herself 200-300 years in the past? She's entirely too calm about the whole thing for my taste. I would alternate between "OMG, get me outta here!" and "Must be an acid flashback, a horrible fever, I'm dead" etc. Nope, she's just sort of "Hmm...OK, I'm in the same location but not the same century. Oh well!"

Finally intruding on my suspension of disbelief is the language issue. She says more than once that she doesn't understand her new husband (or anyone else) when they speak Welsh. But she seems to understand everything else perfectly. Well, I don't know about Claire, but the Enlish we speak now is NOT the English that was spoken a few hundred years ago. Anyone else ever struggle with Shakespeare? Yeah, exactly. So for her to only have comprehension issues when Welsh is used, or to only have trouble with one or two phrases her new companions use just didn't ring true to me.

To the friend that sent me the book, sorry. This is defiinitely a did-not-finish-nor-do-I-wish-to.