Highland Love Song by Constance O'Banyon

Highland Love Song
Constance O'Banyon
Rating 3.5 stars
322 pages

Read For:
RYOB Challenge
A to Z Challenge
New Author Challenge
Chick Porn Challenge
Serial Readers Challenge

Synopsis: Lady Arrian DeWinter, daughter of the English duke of Ravenworth, was determined to escape the highland castle of Warrick Glencarin. For her senses were perilously near surrender to the very man who held her as a pawn in a family feud. And escape she did, though she left behind her heart to a man who dared not believe he’d won it.
Betrothed to Ian MacIvors, lovely Arrian struggled to despise her fiance’s enemy. Yet all she longed for was Warrick and the chance to soften his bitter anger with her loving touch…

My Review: Highland Love Song was my first book by this author and after finishing it I'm happy to say not my last. Written in 1993, HLS is very much an old school "bodice ripper". Meaning the storyline is fairly interwoven with scandals, high drama, kidnapping, family saga and an emotionally charged storyline. Be forewarned, this story is all drama and no "light" moments.

Highland Love Song is actually book two in the DeWinter Saga, though I read it without knowing of the first and still enjoyed the book. Though I'll now go back and read Arrian's parents story in Song Of The Nightingale. Arrian and Warrick were good lead characters-the heroine was not too flighty, and the hero, while brooding and dark, was no brute.

Miss O'Banyon's forte seems in her writing fleshed out secondary characters, and HLS was full of great ones. The best were MacTavish, Arrian's Aunt Mary, and her brother Michael-who is the hero in book three in the series, Desert Song. The love scenes were so so and few and did detract from the storyline-if they were better this would have been at least a four star book. If you enjoy connected family sagas like Lindsey's Mallory's or Laurens Cynster's, then I think you'll enjoy this book.
3.5 stars.