This is a must for anyone who wants a greater understanding of Border Politics and how the 'Border Reiver'was born and sustained. Tom Moss is a great historian and enthusiast for this particular period in history and this book is a brave attempt to combine both a factual history with a fictional account of the same event. Anyone who has watched 'Braveheart' will realise that the two are uncomfortable bedfellows - to write a fictional account of a real event or person requires a degree of 'flexibility' with the facts to engender excitement that sometimes requires a considerable amount of liberty with the facts! Tom is, ultimately, a historian with an encyclopaedic knowledge for the facts and the research. As a consequence I feel he has a historian's reluctance to travel too far from the reality of the situation - so, for me, I feel he should have stayed with a factual and interpretive book, and leave the fiction to those with slightly less regard for reality - the incident which came close to reducing two countries to war is exciting enough - fiction sometimes demands heros and frankly the reality of the situation is that few of the players in this story earn that title! This may sound like a criticism - but you will note I still have given it 5 stars - as someone with enough knowledge of the period to be slightly dangerous - I found the book un-put-downable - anyone with a Border ancestry should read this - as an Elliot, my Clan played a part, as did obviously the Scotts, Armstrongs, Grahams, Irvings and many others - Tom Moss will bring you real insight with this book and the photos and paintings in this hardback are worth the cover price alone.Read it - you will come away with a better understanding of these unique men in a unique time!
