The Douglas Bastard by J.R. Tomlin is part of a series of historical fiction, none of which I had read, but that didn’t stop me from enjoying this book.

The story begins in 1338 and young Archibald Douglas’s mother has just died of the flux and his father Sir James Douglas is already dead. Archie is only nine years old but his friend King David is fifteen. Both of them are exiled in France and when David says that Archie will need a foster father Archie isn’t keen, but he’s quickly settled as a page in the royal household to be taught everything someone of his status should know – eventually. As Archie is illegitimate he’s lucky to be in such a position. Archie dreams of getting back to Scotland to fight the English and with the help of his father’s relatives who recognise him as Sir James’s son he manages to do that.

This is a good adventure tale and although there are a lot of gory battle scenes which I generally don’t like I still enjoyed it enough to wish I had read the previous three books in the series although this can be read as a standalone book. It was good to be reading about Scottish history which doesn’t revolve around Jacobites which is the era that most fiction authors tend to focus on.

The author seems to have done lots of research, and there’s a glossary at the back for those that might not understand mediaeval or Scots words.

Thank you to Albannach Publishing who sent me a digital copy of the book for review via Netgalley.