The MacGregors and Fergussons are enemies. It all started over a childhood fight when Tristan MacGregor and Alex Fergusson fought but Alex cheated and broke Tristan’s nose, winning the battle. Alex’s father, after drinking way too much killed Tristan’s uncle, Robert Campbell, Eleventh Earl of Argyll, with his bow and arrow. Angered by this, Tristan’s father hunted down Archibald Fergusson, Alex’s father, and cut him down with his sword. It’s been almost eleven years and the clans still hate each other.

Tristan is womanizer who flirts with just about every woman and usually gets what he wants from them. His clan is wealthy and he is a second born so he doesn’t have all of the responsibilities of his older brother, Rob, who will one day become clan leader. Tristan uses his time seducing women and living for the moment. He is not like the rest of his clan who are quick to anger and solve problems with the sword. He prefers to use words to solve disputes. He wanted to be just like his uncle, chivalrous and gallant, but when his uncle was murdered, he stopped caring and became a playboy shirking his responsibilities.

Isobel has had to raise her six brothers since her father’s murder. Her mother had died before her father so she and her siblings were left orphans when the Devil MacGregor cut her father down outside their home while they watched from an upstairs window. The rest of the clan left them on their own and moved, fearing that the MacGregors would come back and kill all of them. Her life has been difficult and her family barely has the means to survive. What they do have, other clans raid and steal because they know the Fergussons have little protection and can’t fight against them. Because of this, Isobel’s hatred for the MacGregors has flourished.

Isobel Fergusson and Tristan MacGregor meet in the Privy Garden at Whitehall Palace while their clans are there for the coronation of King James II and start flirting with each other. Neither one knows who the other one is when they first meet. Tristan tries to seduce Isobel but she isn’t so easy to fool as other women. Just because he has a pretty face, doesn’t mean she will allow herself to be ensnared by his charms. Tristan is beguiled by Isobel’s sharp tongue and her wit and believes she is unlike any other woman he has ever met. But when Isobel finds out Tristan is a MacGregor, she tells him she wants nothing to do with him.

After returning home, Tristan can’t get Isobel out of his mind so he travels to where Isobel lives far from his home. When he gets there, he thinks her home has been abandoned but then hears her working in the barn. He tries to sneak towards her but gets ambushed by her brothers. One brother shoots him in the arm with an arrow while the other hits him in the head with a rock from his slingshot. Tristan ends up with one arm tied to the bed and Isobel taking care of his injuries, not because she cares but because she is afraid if he dies, her father will come and seek revenge on her brothers.

I love Isobel’s brothers, especially the youngest, Tamas, who was wild and out of control. Tamas likes to play practical jokes on people. While Tristan is in bed, Tamas puts honey on his chest and sets hornets loose to sting him. Tristan tells him that he will get him back because he is the master of trickery and terrorized his brothers when he was a kid.

Tristan ends up having to stay a while to heal and all of Isobel’s brothers, besides Tamas, start to really like him as he helps out on their farm and even fights some men who came to burn their crops. Tristan believes there can be peace between the Fergussons and MacGregors if only Isobel would allow it. But Isobel and her brothers have a secret. It wasn’t her father who shot Tristan’s favorite uncle but one of them. It was an accident and her father took the blame to protect them.

What will Tristan and his family do to them when they find out?
I have to say, I enjoyed this book tremendously but at times tired of Isobel’s hatred towards Tristan. I thought she was a bit rude and cruel at times too and I think it went on for way too long. Other than that, I am really enjoying getting to know the characters in this series.

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2.5 stars rounded up. I didn't like this heroine. She was unreasonable and cast aspersions on the hero loooong after he had already proven himself to be an honorable man. More than that, she continued to treat him like he was her enemy. It's a Romeo and Juliet sort of family scenario, so obviously conflict is built into it, but neither of these two are responsible for their families grudges, and both would benefit from a truce. She gets in her own way over and over though, and it took away from the sympathy I would otherwise have had for her. Not only has the hero only ever been kind to her, but he also saves her from sexual assault by two men, and resists trouncing her brother even when the brother had been goading him and the hero would have been pretty justified. And later the hero is injured and in her care and *still* she goes out of her way to treat him poorly! Even if he hadn't already saved them both by this point, picking on an invalid who hasn't done anything to you is super lame AND endangers her entire family by stoking the feud! They already believe his clan is a bunch of cold blooded killers, so unless they plan on killing him and hiding the body, there's nothing at all to stop him from reporting back to his family that he was abused when he was an injured guest in their home. And her family doesn't have a chance in Hell of fighting them off if they're ever angered enough to attack. So it's ridiculously reckless and stupid and mean, lol, both to provoke a dangerous foe, and to mistreat someone who has done nothing to deserve it. She basically poisons him and uses his inherent kindness to her feelings to manipulate him into eating all of it! Wtf? That's seriously despicable behaviour actually, to do to even someone who has personally wronged you, much less someone who saved you from being gang raped! ?? (They also make her out to be a maternal figure amongst her siblings, but two of them are bullies, and she coddles them from experiencing any consequences anyway, so she's not even very good at raising them). So there's a lot to dislike her for, and not all that much left to offset it. She's a hard worker I suppose. The effort in their relationship felt like it was 95-5, which doesn't particularly interest me either. Besides her though, I liked the hero and how sympathetically they showed both sides of the grudge. So three stars, but just barely, because of the horrid heroine. ( )

I loved this story....

It started off a little to cliché. But after a few chapters I was lost in it. I fell head over heels in love with the characters. I loved Isobel's family. Her brothers were wonderful. Tamas was my favorite. Such a naughty little boy.

The story surrounds Isobel and Tristan. Their families are divided by tragedy in the past. Tristan and Isobel fall for each other against their better judgment. Then have to convince their families to accept each other.

You will love the plot twists and turns. You will love the forgiveness and redemption. The family dynamic. I would love to see books about Isobel's brothers. Patrick, Cameron, Alex, John, Lachlan, and Tamas.

I highly recommend this book. I couldn't put it down.

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I really enjoyed "Seduced by a Highlander" by Paula Quinn. This has been a great series so far and each book is better than the previous. These characters are so well written and each story grips you right away and leaves you wanting more when it's done.
I can't wait to see what comes next for this Highlander clan.
Happy Reading...enjoy! ( )

Seduced by a Highlander by Paula Quinn
#2 Children of the Mist
Blackstone Audio, Narrated by Carrington MacDuffie

Tristan MacGregor is the adorable, girl-crazy younger brother to Robert (from the first book in the series). Even though he is outwardly lighthearted, he carries a lot of guilt and sadness after his hot temper begat circumstances which caused the death of his beloved uncle over a decade earlier.

Redheaded, freckle-faced Isobel Fergusson, along with her brother, Patrick, have raised their younger siblings for the last ten years after their brood was orphaned. Their mother died in childbirth, and their father followed a year later when he got involved in a clan skirmish in which he was killed.

When Tristan and Isobel first meet after traveling to England for the king's coronation, they like each other immediately and enjoy visiting in the king's garden. Their friendship ends quickly when they realize their families are enemies. Both his uncle and her father were the ones killed years earlier, and they must stay loyal to their families. Tristan, however, cannot get Isobel out of his mind, and when he travels to her farm and sees how hard her whole family has to work to survive, he feels guilty as he realizes it may be his fault that their father was killed. He stays on at first to recover from injuries sustained (by Isobel's younger brothers, no less) when he first arrived to their lands, then continues on to help them with chores. When he learns that Isobel has recently become betrothed to one of her neighbors, he has to rethink his true reasons for wanting to make her life easier.

This was enjoyable, but not to the same level as the first in the series, [Ravished by a Highlander]. Although the characters were very likeable, the story itself didn't grab me as much as #1. This was read by the same talented narrator. ( )