A Fugitive Green podcast series
Chapter 1-3
With this podcast episode, “Their Course is Set”, we delve into the brand-new novella by Diana Gabaldon, A Fugitive Green. It is one of seven novellas within the recently released Seven Stones to Stand or Fall. This novella features the stories of Minerva Wattiswade aka Minnie Rennie and Harold “Hal” Grey, Lord Melton/Duke of Pardloe, and how they came to be the dynamic and fascinating long wed couple we meet in the Outlander series and other novellas. I hope you enjoy the six to eight-part podcast series.
Minnie Rennie, daughter of book and information dealer Andrew Rennie, finds herself going to London alone in the spring of 1744. She is there to do work for her father, find her mother whom she’s never met, and make social connections.
Due to her unconventional upbringing, she’s a worldly, savvy, clever, and self-assured young woman of 17-years. She’s been working in her father’s business her whole life. She’s never met her mother. Our Claire also had an unconventional upbringing after the death of her parents. This seems to be a building block for strong and culturally challenging women. London is not a safe place for a single young woman. Her father has set-up two bodyguards (the O’Higgins’), and a safe place to stay. He’s also arranged for a marriage broker to get her in to society and find her a proper Englishman to wed. This was a surprise to Minnie and she is impressed by her father’s trap.
Hal on the other hand is an absolute mess. His life is in turmoil after the death of his wife Esme and child during a too early labor, he kills Nathaniel Twelvetrees in a duel for having an affair with his wife Esme, and the continuing shadow left from his father’s suicide on the eve of being arrested for being a Jacobite and traitor to the Crown. Hal is in his early twenties, but he’s lived a lifetime already. He’s emotionally fragile and physically unwell. He’s also the target of a job meant for Minnie.
This takes place during Dragonfly in Amber when Jamie and Claire Fraser are in Paris post Wentworth and pre-Jacobite uprising. We meet some familair and new characters along the way.
Here are the links I promised for what I found extra interesting within the pages of these first chapters.
- Madagascar hissing cockroaches – Frederick the roach is presumably for the Bonnie Prince to give to Louise his mistress.
- Culpeper’s Herbal – in some form this has been in print since 1653
- Persian Letters – the book Jamie purchased from Andrew Rennie
- Collected Sermons of the Reverend George V. Sykes – it is a real book, written by Diana Gabaldon’s great-great grandfather.
What’s Coming up? The Fugitive Green chapters 4-6, from Seven Stones to Stand or Fall collection.
How can you participate? To have your questions, comments for the regular read along, email or call in to the listener line 3 days prior to airing for inclusion. Join the weekly Twitter chat Wednesday nights at 6pm PT/9pm ET to discuss the previous latest podcast chapters using the hashtag #ADoO. Comments or messages may be included in the podcast or a written post.
The entire Outlander book series is written by Diana Gabaldon. You can find her on Twitter and Facebook.
All images are Wiki Commons. Click link for attribution. Featured Image By Rept0n1x – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0,
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A Dram of Outlander 