Book and TV Obsessions

“What happened, she says! Aye, what indeed? I tell ye to stay all snug below wi’ Marsali, and next thing I ken, ye’ve dropped out of the sky and landed at my feet, sopping wi’ blood!”

“D’ye ken ye came damn close to dying?” he demanded. “Ye’ve a bone-deep slash down your arm from oxter to elbow, and had I not got a cloth round it in time, ye’d be feeding the sharks this minute!”

“Damn ye, woman! Will ye never do as you’re told?” “Probably not,” I said meekly.

Voyager by Dianna Gabaldon

“Nothing whatever would stand long between Jamie and his wife” An Echo in the Bone chapter 101

“She’d said she thought of cutting her wrists when she believed him dead. He didn’t think he’d do it that way, if she died.”

“Perhaps this was purgatory, he thought, and gave a wan smile at memory of himself, waking on Culloden Moor so many years ago,”

“But to live without her—he watched her breathe, obsessively, counting ten breaths before he would believe she hadn’t stopped—that would certainly be his purgatory.”

After a few rewatches I am actually impressed with how they handled this storyline. This was one of my favorite storylines from the book because we rarely see Claire hurt or sick and it’s sort of a switch of Jamie and Claire’s typical roles.

As like most of this season, it did feel a little rushed with the time jumps, which do happen in the books. If they had more time I would have liked to see the parts with Jamie taking care of Claire right after her surgery and through her fever.

They managed to keep the most important scenes which I was pleasantly surprised by with the little time they had. I didn’t like that they rushed Leckie helping Claire in the show. While he isn’t able to do much in the books either it does explain that he stays until the bleeding slowed and he says that he would come back.

Jamie shouting out Leckie is from the books, but he says it in Gaelic. I’m sure the change to English was so everyone would know what he was saying, but it’s one of those things that I think that doesn’t really carry the same meaning when translated and would’ve made more sense if the kept it in Gaelic and just added subtitles.

I found it interesting that they left out Jamie being the first to ask for Denny in the show, but he was probably just in shock and wasn’t thinking straight.

One of the interesting changes the show made with the cheese is Claire tells Denny to make a poultice out of it. In the books she tells him to pack the wound with cheese. I’m no doctor so I have no idea which way would work if either. The show skipped over showing the actual surgery, but it’s not important to the overall story so I get it.

Jamie’s monologue about Claires blood loss is from the books, but it was his internal thoughts. The show leaves out him remembering Claire saying she thought about slitting her wrist when she thought he was dead. He decides that he wouldn’t do that because there are too many people who need him, but he believes that if he had to live without her that would be his purgatory.

I loved that the show included Jamie helping Claire when she had to use the chamber pot. It was such a vulnerable moment for her and I loved them bickering like the old married couple they are.

“Do you ever—well, no. I know you do.”

“Likely,” he said, smiling a little. “What do I do?” “See the … the void. The abyss.”

“ I mean—it’s always there, always yawning at your feet, but most people manage to ignore it, not think about it. I’ve mostly been able to. You have to, to do medicine.”

“It’s—it’s just … nothing. And so much endless nothing … It’s as though nothing you do, nothing you are, can possibly matter, it’s all just swallowed up …”

“I can’t explain,” I said, defeated. “It wasn’t there—or I wasn’t looking at it—after I was shot. It wasn’t nearly dying that made me look in, see it yawning there. But being so … so bloody frail! Being so stinking afraid.”

“Not death,” I said at last, sniffing. “Futility. Uselessness. Bloody entropy. Death matters, at least sometimes.”

“I ken that,” Jamie said softly, “It’s why a warrior doesna fear death so much. He has the hope—sometimes the certainty—that his death will matter.”

“D’ye see the sky?” he said, a little later. “Is it not a void there?” he said quietly, still looking up. “And yet we’re no afraid to look.”

My voice was hoarse, and I swallowed. “Though I suppose even the stars are burning out, according to the Second Law.”

“Mmphm. Well, I suppose men can make all the laws they like,” he said, “but God made hope. The stars willna burn out.” He turned and, cupping my chin, kissed me gently. “And nor will we.”

Made a book club on Fable if anyone is interested in joining!