Recent Read

Untamed by Pamela Clare

Why this one: It’s Pamela Clare!!

Steam Level: It’s Pamela Clare!!

Further explanation: When you read one of her books you almost need a fan in one hand and ice cubes in the other – and this one is no exception.

Author's Website Blurb: MacKinnon’s Rangers
They were a band of brothers, their loyalty to one another forged by hardship and battle, the bond between these Highland warriors, rugged colonials, and fierce Native Americans stronger even than blood ties.

Untamed
Though forced to fight for the hated British, Morgan MacKinnon would no more betray the men he leads than slit his own throat—not even when he was captured by the French and threatened with an agonizing death by fire at the hands of their Abenaki allies. Only the look of innocent longing in the eyes of a convent-bred French lass could make him question his vow to escape and return to the Rangers. And soon the sweet passion he awoke in Amalie had him cursing the war that forced him to choose between upholding his honor and pledging himself to the woman he loves.

My Thoughts: I’ll be honest. I got an ARC of this and I started it a couple of weeks ago. But that was when I was still in the after glow of another certain book and when I started reading Untamed, I hadn’t had enough time away. I read the first couple of pages and wasn’t ‘feeling’ it. I knew I had to read a few books outside the historical genre in between to ‘cleanse the reading pallet’ so to speak so that I could fully appreciate the reading experience because I knew it would be a good one.

And it was!! When I closed the final back cover I said a heartfelt ‘Aaaaaah’ – you know – the kind of noise you make when something has really satisfied you *naughty wink*

Ride the Fire is my favourite of her books (among some Most Excellent Reads) and I think this one comes darn close to RTF for this happy Colonial reader.

Morgan MacKinnon makes a wonderful hero. You really feel his struggle as he agrees to spy for the French in order to escape a horrendous fate of being burned alive for an earlier battle (detailed in Surrender – another fabulous book and the first in the MacKinnon Brothers Trilogy). If he had his way, he truly would fight on their side since he admires Bourlamaque, the commander of the French fort and the godfather of Amalie, the heroine. The Scottish and the French were more natural allies than the Scottish and the hated British. But Morgan has no choice but to ultimately betray the French, even as he agrees to help them, as he and his two brothers have been blackmailed into helping the British win the war. And to betray the British would be to betray his brothers, something he simply can not do. So with this on his mind, he is truly torn when he starts developing feelings for Amalie, the daughter of a French commander and an Abenaki woman. He is an honourable man who is torn apart trying to do the ‘right’ thing.

And Amalie is a wonderful heroine. When she first meets Morgan, she is prepared to hate him. After all, it was the MacKinnon Rangers who had been responsible for the death of so many of her people. She is assigned to treating his injuries so that he can be made to give up his secrets and then handed over to the Abenaki. But as she slowly gets to know him, as she sees the honourable man he really is, she can’t bear the thought of this brave and handsome enemy being handed over and she comes up with a way he can be saved – by switching sides.

Raised in a convent and never really fitting in because of her ‘mixed’ blood, she is confused by the feelings that Morgan stirs up in her. She is innocent and curious, naive and sensual, and a fine heroine for the oh so gooooood Morgan.

This is another fab story by the amazingly talented Pamela Clare. She has a way of writing that draws you in; that makes you feel as if you are right there experiencing what the characters are experiencing.

And I can’t say enough about how much I LOVE the setting. My Dad was a real history buff and I shared it with him. I remember when I was a young'un, he would drag my mother and younger sisters to old forts. But I was enthralled whenever we would go and would wander around and picture myself back in those times. So when I discovered Pamela Clare and especially when she moved to the French Indian War settings in Ride the Fire, Surrender and Untamed, it brought back all those wonderful memories from childhood.

The fact that she writes such poignant and wonderful romance stories in this setting and time period just totally warms the cockles of my heart!!

If you have never tried her, seriously – I urge you to give her books a read. And you can’t get much better than Untamed. Although it’s the second book in a series, I think it would work fine if you haven’t read the first one. But if you do want to read the first book first, or her previous Colonial books, they’ve just been re-released.

So – what are you waiting for *g*?

Grade: 5 out of 5

We Pamela Clare fans have been lucky this year. Although she didn’t have any new releases last year, she’s had two this year. Her first one, Unlawful Contact got a 5er from me and now same with Untamed. It’s a rare talent I think, to write so very well in two such different genres and Historical Colonial and Romantic Suspense.