Son of the Morning

I read this book on a whim last year and i have read it several times since then! The story captivated me from the very beginning. Grace St. John is a researcher translating old documents that talk of a treasure and the Knights Templar. After suffering a tragic loss (Iwon't give too much away) she is on the run and furiously translating the key to the mystery, and trying to escape the danger that is chasing her. She has dreams about a gorgeous warrior, and he knows she is there...they're not dreams, but quasi-visions of another time. She eventually travels back in time and confronts the man of her dreams- literally, and tries to save the world. The heroine was gutsy and strong, brilliant and determined, while still being feminine. the secondary characters were wonderful and the hero...wow...totally male and sexy. I thouroughly enjoyed both the basic plot (I am an historian and archaeologist with a weakness for romance) and the incredible love story that is constructed around these two wonderful individuals.

Grace has everything to lose: a happy life with a loving husband, a wonderful brother and an amazing career. She loses it all in one moment. To save herself and avenge the murders of her husband and brother, she is on the run with the very documents that caused all this horror. The police, thinking she killed her husband and brother, and the killer, who wants the documents, are both after her, but she is a strong and an intelligent woman and she gets away...just barely . She learns "street smarts" and how to survive despite this agressive murderer on her tail.When Grace discovers the mystery the documents hold, she knows she must travel through time as the documents explain to meet Black Niall, who she has been dreaming about since she first discovered the documents. He has shared her hot dreams and their lust for each other is so powerful all he has to do is kiss her to make her explode with passion. With Niall's help, they travel back to 1998 to face the ruthless killer. Niall is almost God-like in his strength and the love he shares with Grace makes you wonder if they were made for each other.I expected a romance novel but instead, this novel was filled with action, suspence and VERY little romance...but when she finally does meet Black Niall (65 pages away from the end of the book!) they share some amazingly HOT scenes!! The story reminded me of the movie "The Fugitive" mixed with the film "Mission Impossible," But I didn't find the lack of romance all that dissapointing because the story was so well-written and interesting. This story should be classified as a suspence thriller. She doesn't even meet the hero until page 340 (The story ends at page 400). Most of the novel is about her running from the killers. It's exciting and you really come to love Grace and care about her character. She is so three-dimensional, she seems like a real person.Black Niall sounds delicious but he also plays a minor role in the novel. He is like the supporting character and he comes across as 2-dimensional. I never fell in love with him but I did lust after him. The ending was sweet but I had another ending in mind that never came to fruition. However, that made the novel UNpredictable and that's a good thing. This is my first novel to read by Linda Howard, and I see myself picking up MANY more in the future. I HIGHLY recommend!

Linda Howard's Son of the Morning is a book that I will keep and no doubt read again, which I don't often do. Having just completed the series by Diana Gabaldon, Outlander, and wondering what I would read while waiting for the next book in the series, I decided to read Son of the Morning.Once I read the first few pages I was hooked on this book. For those of you not familiar with the Outlander series it's a time-travel Scottish romance and Son of the Morning is also a time-travel Scottish romance. That is where the similarity ends because Linda Howard has written a book that stands on it's own merit. The main character is a woman, Grace St. John, who translates ancient manuscripts for Parrish Sawyer the head of an archaeological foundation. Grace is currently translating documents from the 14th century concerning a group of monks called the Knights of the Templar and their mysterious treasure. They were monks but they were also warriors, the best and most fierce warriors in the land. Thus far Grace has translated enough of the documents to know that King Philip and Pope Clement executed and tortured many of the Knights of the Templar in 1307 to find and gain control of their gold and the legendary treasure. The Grand Master of the Knights ordains that the best warrior of the Order, Niall of Scotland, will watch over and protect the treasures. Niall, or Black Niall as he is called, establishes a strong hold in Creag Dhu, a castle in Scotland to hide and protect the treasure and he is known as The Guardian.Grace's life suddenly and violently changes when she witnesses Parrish Sawyer murder her husband Ford and her brother Bryant. She over hears Sawyer's plan to find and murder her as well to get the documents she is translating. Grace begins a year of running for her life from Parrish Sawyer and his hired assassins. While Grace is struggling to survive in the street and hide from her pursuers she knows she must finish translating the documents so she can discover what is in them that Sawyer was willing to kill for. Grace goes through a major transformation while she is in hiding and struggling to survive.After Grace completes the translation and learns the secret of the documents she knows she must travel back in time to the 14th century to Creag Dhu and Niall of Scotland in order to stop the Foundation from finding the secret treasure and using it for their evil ends. Since time travel was one of the secret powers of the Knights of the Templar, the documents contained detail instructions on how to travel back in time.I literally could not put this book down. It's exciting, intriguing and adventurous. The reader is taken back and forth between the 14th century with Niall and present day with Grace's hair-raising narrow escapes from the killers.I highly recommend Son of the Morning to anyone who enjoys time travel stories, adventure, and romance. And especially to readers who are fans of the Outlander series, I promise you'll love

I read this book because of the time travel after reading another similar romance theme. WOW! My only disappointment was that there wasn't more book. Linda Howard amazed me with Grace's authentic struggles to stay one step ahead of her pursuers. Grace's character made me proud to be a woman. I loved her because she wasn't particularly beautiful or helpless, instead she more like us ordinary human females. What made her so extraordinary was her intelligence and willingness to do and learn anything necessary to survive and extract vengeance. Black Niall was a terrific hero. He can haunt my dreams anytime. I liked him rough, very masculine, and just slightly barbaric. Linda Howard did an excellent job of creating in Niall a hidden sensitivity and vulnerability that made him irrisistible. You realize very quickly that he loved and needed Grace passionately when he chose not to kill her, as his duty demanded, for discovering the "treasure". I understand Niall's anger with God for the destruction of the Templars not only because they had been in God's service for so long, but also, because they had become Niall's friends and "brothers". I think it was important to Niall to have family because he couldn't claim his own. It was a bit ironic that as the "Guardian", Niall could travel through time but he couldn't see far enough into the future realized that his God had provided for him.For the reader in San Diego, if you wanted something that dealt with only fact and truth, look for your next book in NON-FICTION. Don't pick out a book whose excerpt reads: heroine travels back in time to meet hero. You'll be sadly disapointed. I take my own religion quite seriously but I also realize that fiction is just that: fiction. To enjoy you must "suspend your disbelief". By the way, Niall never wanted to become a monk, he was forced to in order to live. However, he never broke any of the vows he took while they were invoked. Remember that once the Templars were disbanded and he became the "guardian", all vows were revoked except that to protect the treasure with his life for as long as he lived. Niall was a lusty fellow, but then again, in those times, most men were.