The Outlandish Companion | Diana Gabaldon | Great insight into the Outlander series

The Outlandish Companion | Diana Gabaldon | The Outstanding Outlander Companion

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The Outlandish Com...

	The Outlandish Companion Diana Gabaldon Delacorte Press, 1999 - 608 pages average customer review:based on 155 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

New York Times bestselling author Diana Gabaldon has captured the hearts of millions with her critically acclaimed novels, Outlander. Dragonfly In Amber, Voyager, and Drums Of Autumn. From the moment Claire Randall accidentally steps through a magical stone that transports her back in time more than 200 years to 1743, and into the arms of Scottish soldier Jamie Fraser, readers have been enthralled with this epic saga of time travel, adventure, and love everlasting.

Now Diana Gabaldon has written the ultimate companion guide to her bestselling series, the book only she could write - a beautifully illustrated compendium of all things Outlandish. As a special bonus for those who are eagerly awaiting the next appearance of Jamie and Claire, she includes never - before - published excerpts from upcoming works in the series. And there's lots more in this lavish keepsake volume for the many devoted fans who yearn to learn the stories behind the stories:

? Full synopses of Outlander, Dragonfly in Amber, Voyager, and Drums of Autumn
? A complete listing of the characters in all four novels, including extensively researched family trees and genealogical notes
? Professionally cast horoscopes for Jamie and Claire
? A comprehensive glossary and pronunciation guide to Gaelic terms and usage
? The fully explicated Gabaldon Theory of Time Travel
? Frequently asked questions to the author and her (sometimes surprising) answers
? An annotated bibliography
? Tips, personal stories - even a recipe or two
? Essays about medicine and magic in the eighteenth century, researching historical fiction, and more

With the insight, humor, and eye for detail that has made her novels such an outstanding success story. Diana Gabaldon here gives her readers the best gift of all?The Outlandish Companion.

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Great insight into the Outlander series

This is an excellent companion book to the Outlander series of books. I would recommend this book to any reader who wants a bit more information on the process of writing. Was a bit disappointing to find extracts of her more recent novels in this book... a bit like paying for the same books twice, but apart from that, it was very interesting. Was also a lot cheaper to buy from Amazon new that to buy second hand of another site in Australia.

The Outstanding Outlander Companion

Outstanding addition for those who have enjoyed the series. Many details are clarified and explanations for why are given. A must for those who have read the books as they were published and forget the minor subplots over time.

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A good companion

Not exactly what I expected but overall a good companion for the Outlander series. I think it was worth the price just to find out how to correctly pronounce Laoghaire (which in my mind was pronounced as Log-hair).

Companion

THE OUTLANDISH COMPANION is a fan's handbook that is as engaging as the series it details. Diana Gabaldon's expert early computer skills, Google did not exist when she started writing the Outlander series. She was working with scientific data.
The horoscopes were drawn by a fan and make fascinating reading, you wonder if Diana will use any of the information as character points. Tempe ting for a writer but shaky for a scientist.
The dictionary (glossary) could be stronger, but I know the problems with that one. What is obvious and what is necessary are vital questions.
Read the stories, then the companion and hope there will be a second companion when the series is complete.
Nash Black, author of WRITING AS A SMALL BUSINESS and SINS OF THE FATHERS.

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Delivers What It Promises

Fans of this (some say too wordy) time traveling series will find a generous amount of information given here, both of the behind the scenes sort and simply of the type that details and hopefully enhances an understanding of the colorful world Diana Gabaldon has created over the past decade and a half. As they've moved from Scotland to North Carolina, England to France, from the twentieth century to the eighteenth, the characters of these novels have certainly lived eventful, albeit imaginary lives, and in the pages of this encyclopedic overview, much is, as promised, explained by this likeably down to earth writer. Gabaldon has cordially taken the time to answer the questions readers have most often asked her, listed and given short biographies of everyone (sigh, yes everyone) who ever appeared in her hefty books, has talked about settings, customs, legends, histories, and anachronisms as they've related to her 4,000-plus page-long saga, and has probably unintentionally turned out yet another work so massive it will bend the shelves of almost any bookcase.

Of course for those (um, like me) who bailed out after getting through the first book and who might wish to read condensations of Gabaldon's epic novels in order to see what came next, The Outlandish Companion is a time saver, because it includes dense, thorough, Cliff Notes' like overviews of every book in the series the author had released up to the time of this guide's publication. Personally I found spending two hours reading a couple hundred pages of overviews was more enjoyable than investing three months in her novels, but I know fans of the series will glare at me for thinking so, and I respectfully understand why.

All in all I'm tempted to say a hard-core fan might get more from The Outlandish Companion than someone who has casually read her works, but there is still much here to catch the eye. Frankly, there is also a lot contained within that the book would have been better without. Like her novels themselves, this reference work was too wordy, too self-indulgent, and heavy enough to leave your chest bruised if you try to read it in bed.

Possess it at your own peril...

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