After the mess that was the end of Echo of the Bone, I am so, so happy that this book is a return to form and begins to make things right from the previous books. 
 This book opens where the last one ended, and as such we get to see the continuation of the Jamie/Lord John discussion. Thankfully, this goes much the way I'd hoped it would and it is something that continues, quite rightly, throughout the book. I don't care for Lord John, so I was cheering this on, but this book did actually make me like him a little. His story was mostly separate from Jamie and Claire's and that was a good thing, I think. 
 One of the other weak points in the previous book was the abundance of William, but again, somehow in this book I actually started to like him. Sure, he acted like a petulant child at times, but somehow he was always just on the right side of sympathetic. Just barely sometimes, but still...I didn't feel like I had to skim his parts this time. 
 Ian continues to be wonderful, although I still can't get into him and Rachel as a couple, or even Rachel as a character. I suppose with a cast this large that you can't like everyone, but I can't help but be sad that Ian got lumbered with her instead of someone I really love. 
 The Roger/Brianna stuff...I enjoyed this, but I must confess to being a little confused about what the point of them travelling back so far was from a plot POV. It was great to see some of the characters we knew previously (although Roger praying for Randall made me want to slap him), but I just don't understand what the end game is here. 
 Jamie and Claire...I just love them so much. I loved seeing Claire so vulnerable, and then seeing how Jamie coped when Claire was hurt. They were back to being a true partnership and I forgot how badly I missed that. I hope that continues in the next book. 
 Speaking of the next book...this book actually ended perfectly that I would almost be content with it being the last one, but I'm just not quite ready to say goodbye to Jamie and Claire yet, so I'll read as many of them as I can get. 
 I've spent the best part of the last 12 weeks reading these books, and now that I'm caught up I'm not quite sure what to do with myself. I don't know how I'll cope waiting for 4 or 5 years for the next one.