I read this as child, and it awakened in me an awareness of other places and ways of being.

Loved this book! Had to have the binding re-bound. Take it out now and then and reread it. Love this book!

I have no idea why I like this book or to whom I would recommend it in particular. I just know that I love it and will likely read it again.

After passing it on to a friend, with no explanation, she reported back, "I have no idea why I couldn't put it down, but I couldn't... and I have no idea how to explain it to someone else."

1885-1905 Scotland about a mining town family

This is the book that got me on the path to recreational reading in high school, 32 years ago... I loved this book!

So I'm pretty disappointed. The writing here is very good and the plot is excellent. Scotland, coal mines, illegal salmon fishing and kelp soup. What's not to love, right? But after reading about 200 something pages,I found I just wasn't enjoying the story anymore because of the strong profanity. "Pit talk". I was warned, (Thanks Diane!) but I was hoping it wouldn't be quite so excessive.

Be prepared for all the usual cuss words, religious and otherwise as well as F bombs aplenty.

If profanity doesn't bother you, the story itself is fascinating, and any sex is fade to black.

And by the way, if you're purchasing this book used, go for the hardback over the soft cover. The binding of the paperback cracks and falls apart. (I bought mine twice and it was the same with both of them, others here on GR have had the same issue).

First lines:

She was awake. Sound asleep one moment, her eyes wide open the next, staring up into the blackness of the ceiling. She didn't like the night, but she had forced her mind to wake her in the deepest part of it. In control, that was the main thing. It pleased her.

Maggie Drum wants an early start to the day as it's her 16th birthday and she is leaving home to find a husband. This is a very well written book with a lot of ups and downs. Lots here about the early days of coal mining in Scotland. That is coal mining in all of its dirty ugliness. I recommend this to people interested in historical fiction of Scotland.

One of those solid, stick-to-the-ribs family sagas; the adventures of a spunky young woman from a poor coal mining town in Scotland, who leaves home to find her fortune.

A carefully plotted, brilliantly crafted work of historical fiction set in the desperate poverty of a Scottish coal mining village. Like Denise Giardina's Storming Heaven, which also portrays the struggle of bitterly poor miners against the mine owner, Crichton has no difficulty making the romance of collective struggle come alive. Unlike the miners in Storming Heaven, Crichton's miners have no union support and must organize themselves to improve their starvation wages and incredibly dangerous working conditions. Crichton centers his plot around the strike organizer's strong willed indomitable wife Maggie, who has social ambitions and opposes the strike. The result is a fascinating clash of wills, in which Gillon ultimately prevails and Maggie finances the strike from housekeeping money she has scrimped and saved over more than 20 years. Crichton's second and last novel. I prefer it to the Secret of Santa Vittoria (Crichton's first novel which became a movie), as I feel the characters are stronger and better developed.

By Dr Stuart Jeanne Bramhall, author of THE MOST REVOLUTIONARY ACT: MEMOIR OF AN AMERICAN REFUGEE

I read this book many, many years ago and I have never forgotten it - I want to read it again, it was so good.

Robert Crichton wrote two novels, both big bestsellers over 50 years ago. After selling millions of copies, he stopped writing. What a loss!

Both books are on my all-time favorites list. The first, The Secret of Santa Vittoria, is set in Italy during WWII, with a town trying to outwit the Nazis by hiding their stash of local wine. Anthony Quinn starred in the film.

The Camerons is the story of the Scottish working class a hundred years ago. It's a powerhouse of character, setting, and tight writing. I was drawn in by every scene and interaction, whether between Maggie Drum and Gillon Cameron, or between Gillon Cameron and Lord Fyffe, who rules a coal-mining town with a ruthless slave-mongering spirit. Maggie is a force of nature, but her husband Gillon in his own quiet way becomes an instrument of true change.

I laughed, gasped, and wiped a tear from my eye more than once while reading. This is a 500-page book that reads like a 300-page thriller. I couldn't put it down.