The Slaughter of Leith Hall by Lexie Conyngham – Review by Jennifer Gordon

The Slaughter of Leith Hall by Lexie Conyngham
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is a wonderfully written historical fiction novel which took me back to Scotland twenty years after the Battle of Culloden, when there remained strong feelings amongst the Jacobites. The narrative is written in the Scottish dialect of the era which I found hard going to start with but I soon got used to the language and the list of less common words at the end of the book also helped. The list of characters at the start of the book was extremely useful as there are many characters to keep track off. The main character and our hero of the story is Charlie Rob, and until John Leith of Leith Hall takes him under his wing Charlie had not been away from his home in Aberdeenshire and had certainly never been political in his thinking. However the quiet and steady Charlie soon finds himself in the middle of a murder mystery and having to cope with conspiracies in his journey to get justice. Charlie Rob is a very likeable and realistic character and he really made the story for me. The storyline moved along at a good pace and had plenty of twists and turns that kept me guessing and happily turning the pages. The author really made the Scottish era come alive with her detailed descriptions of both time and place. Her obvious knowledge of the historical background of the era also comes through in her writing and I found the historical note by the author at the end fascinating. I was gripped by the story and although this is the first novel by this author I have read, I was pleased to see she has others that I can also now read and I’m pleased to have discovered a new historical fiction writer.

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