Devil in Tartan by Julia London

Narrated by Derek Perkins

The estimable Derek Perkins returns to Julia London’s Highland Grooms series to narrate book four, Devil in Tartan, which features Aulay, the middle son of the Mackenzie brood, and the one least often to be found at the family estate of Balhaire. With his elder brother Cailean living mostly in England with his wife and stepson, and his younger brother, Robbie, aiding their father in the management of the Balhaire estate and lands, Aulay has increasingly come to feel something of an outsider, and has more or less resigned himself to a life alone. He has made his life at sea, captaining the Mackenzie ship and contributing to the family coffers by his various profitable trading enterprises, but his latest voyage, designed to bring in some much needed funds, is destined to end in disaster.

A few days after they have set sail on their latest commission, Aulay and his crew sight a smaller vessel which is clearly in distress and go to its aid. Unfortunately, however, Aulay’s generous intentions prove to be his – and his crew’s – undoing, because despite his caution, the ethereally lovely young woman aboard proves so distracting that a momentary lapse of attention on Aulay’s part enables her crew to incapacitate him and the rest of his crew and to take over his ship.

Charlotte Livingstone is stuck between a rock and a hard place. Her clan is desperately short of money and is unable to meet its obligations to its laird, and their only option now is to sell their illegally-made whisky in Denmark, where such a sale is unlikely to generate suspicion. Lottie, her father and their motley crew set out in the only seaworthy ship on their small island of Lismore – but when their vessel is damaged and her father injured, it’s up to Lottie to find a way to save everyone aboard and their cargo – and when another ship is sighted it’s with great reluctance that she turns pirate and commandeers the Reulag Balhaire.

Aulay is – naturally – not at all pleased when he regains consciousness to find himself bound and gagged in his own cabin, and vows to bring Lottie and her men to justice as soon as he can. But when circumstances force them to work together, he begins to understand that Lottie was motivated by love for her family and had no other way to save her clan and crew than to do as she did. Aulay agrees to help Lottie to find the man she believes will purchase the whisky, but it’s clear once they arrive in Denmark that something is rotten (sorry, couldn’t resist it!) – and they have to beat a hasty retreat. Needless to say, things aren’t plain sailing (ka-ching! I’ll be here all week!) as Lottie and Aulay, forced into close proximity, find themselves fighting a reluctant attraction to one another while also watching for signs that they are being pursued.

That’s pretty much all there is to the plot – Lottie takes over Aulay’s ship, they argue, they fall in love, The End. I’m sitting here trying to remember what else happened and honestly that’s pretty much the entire story. I enjoyed the first two books in this series (Wild Wicked Scot and Sinful Scottish Laird) but wasn’t wild about the third (Hard-Hearted Highlander) and I only decided to pick up Devil in Tartan because I could listen to Derek Perkins read just about anything, and I thought I’d give the series one last go. Sadly, however, I think it’s time for us to part ways, because while I liked Aulay more than I liked Robbie in the last book, I really couldn’t warm to Lottie and the idea that she was so amazingly, breathtakingly incredibly beautiful as to cause an entire crew to go so completely ga-ga that none of them notices the men creeping up behind them with koshes was, frankly, ridiculous. And while I understand that she acted out of desperation, it doesn’t make it her actions in commandeering Aulay’s ship and effectively bankrupting his family any more palatable.

The romance is lacklustre, too; I never felt there was much of an emotional connection between Aulay and Lottie and I never connected with them, either. Neither character is particularly well defined and they both lack depth and that special something that brings them to life in the mind of the listener. Aulay has appeared as a secondary character in the other books in the series, so I was looking forward to learning more about him, but other than his love of the sea – which I already knew – all I learned was that he paints on the quiet and that he is still, at thirty-seven, craving his father’s approval. Lottie is clever enough to know that she can use her looks to her advantage when dealing with men, but otherwise she’s a mess of determined and flustered.

If I hadn’t requested this title for review, I might have set it aside and not returned to it. Fortunately for me, however, Derek Perkins’ smooth, velvety tones kept me company throughout and I was at least able to enjoy his first-rate performance. He seems to have become the go-to narrator for historical romances featuring Scottish heroes and it’s easy to understand why – his accent, as I’ve mentioned in reviews before, is excellent and consistent; he employs enough of the brogue to bring all that sexy Scottishness to bear, but it’s never so thick as to be unintelligible. There are quite a large number of secondary characters in this book – from the various crew members to the Danes Lottie and Aulay approach about purchasing the whisky, to the members of the Mackenzie clan we’ve met before, and Mr. Perkins differentiates between them all very effectively, from salty sea-dog to lady of the manor. His performance is, in all other respects, as accomplished as I’ve come to expect from him, and he continues to be one of the best male narrators of historical romance around. I just wish he’d been given stronger material this time.

If you’ve been following the Highland Grooms series and/or are a fan of Mr. Perkins, then maybe you might want to consider picking up Devil in Tartan. But I can’t in all conscience recommend it for anything other than the narration.

Caz