So... what are you reading?

[JonathanB]

Scotland Michael Lynch only just begun as a break from:

Murder Must Adertise Dorothy L Sayer.

When I was in Edinburgh in last winter, the qualified guide I met (from https://stga.co.uk/ ) told me Lynch was the work they were recommended for their exam.

I've reached 1688 so the Union, Glencoe and Culloden still to come.

I deliberately wanted an popular academic history rather than the TV spinoff as that should give me a wider view.

However it is a bit uphill work at times, as rather than give a narrative, he is commenting on how movements, persons and events in history have been assessed, without explaining who or what they were. Fortunately I've heard of Bannockburn, Flodden, John Knox and Oliver Cromwell already.

The clearest example of this failure to explain is the pages of economic history about feuing, without saying what feuing is. I gather it was a sort of long lease, which gave the landlord an immediate large return but lost him (or her) the possibility of future income. But Lynch doesn't say that clearly.