The Scandalous Secret of Abigail MacGregor by Paula Quinn

Narrated by Carrington MacDuffie

Abigail MacGregor’s family has just received bad news – her mother is to present herself to Queen Anne in England. Normally a visit with a queen is an exciting event; however, in this case, it is a big problem. First, no one but family and a few trusted friends know where the MacGregors are living. Second, Abigail’s family are Jacobites, proscribed and branded as traitors of the current queen. That the queen wants to see Abigail’s mother and will not say why is troubling.

Abigail knows the possible consequences if they send her mother – prison or, even worse, death. She couldn’t bear it if something happend to her mother; so, she decides to go in her place. Her family protests at first but eventually they come to see that Abigail will not be dissuaded. Hoping to be clan chief one day, Abigail knows what she is planning to do is the best thing for the clan.

When the queen’s men arrive for her, their leader is one her family fears – Captain Daniel, the man known as the “Jacobite Killer”. Abigail knows this already bad trip is going to get a lot worse. And when her father challenges Daniel to a battle before he will let them leave, Abigail worries double.

The Scandalous Secret of Abigail MacGregor was a good but not great book. The book is an overall nice read but the plot is not the most original and some aspects of it are a tad ridiculous. The title implies the scandalous secret is Abigail’s when in fact, it’s her mother’s. I guess you could consider the fact that Abigail hid her mother’s secret from Daniel a secret but it is not a particularly scandalous one as the title would lead you to believe. This book would have been better entitled The Scandalous Secret of Daniel Marlow. Next to Abigail’s mother, his is the most scandalous secret.

Then there’s Lady Charlotte’s character and her obsession with Daniel. It feels contrived and stands out from the rest of the story arc. Lady Charlotte is basically stalking Daniel and scaring off his lady friends. His response is to hide his interest in ladies and cater to Lady Charlotte. He doesn’t ask his very good friend, the queen, to banish her from court; he just makes no overt moves that would set her off. And the only place this arc becomes a part of the story is toward the end. You could have taken her character out of the book and it would not have impacted the storyline a great deal.

Carrington MacDuffie is right up there with Kirsten Potter when it comes to narrating Scottish accents. In The Scandalous Secret of Abigail MacGregor, she navigates the range of Highlander and Lowlander ones wonderfully, as well as the range of British upper and lower classes. My only complaint (and it’s a minor one) is that her male voices run together, especially if they are of the same nationality. In group conversations, it made it difficult to know which male Scottish family member was speaking and when. And there were quite a bit of those conversations. The female characters, with their range of British and Scottish accents, didn’t suffer like the males. It wasn’t as big an issue in the end as I knew when Daniel and Abigail were speaking and that’s all that matters. Still, I love MacDuffie and she remains one of my favorite narrators of Scottish romances.

Diana

Narration:  A-

Book Content:  B-

Steam Factor:  Glad I had my ear buds in

Violence:  Fighting

Genre:  Historical Romance

Publisher:  Blackstone Audio

The Scandalous Secret of Abigail MacGregor was provided to AudioGals by Blackstone Audio for review.