The Scotswoman is an American historical novel by Inglis Fletcher. The novel dramatizes the experiences of Flora MacDonald before and during the American Revolutionary War after emigrating to what would become North Carolina. Known for her Carolina Series, in which fictional lead characters interact with real historical figures and events, this was Fletcher's first novel to center an actual historical figure as its protagonist.
Following the defeat of the Scots at Culloden, Flora MacDonald becomes one of many Highlanders to emigrate to the Americas and settle in North Carolina. As tensions leading up to the Battle of Moore's Creek Bridge causes many of the Scots, including Flora and her husband Allan, begin to side with the British colonial forces.
As with all of Fletcher's Carolina novels, The Scotswoman was published in the United States by Bobbs-Merrill. In Canada, it was published by McClelland & Stewart It was reissued in paperback in 1974 by Bantam.
The Scotswoman received mixed reviews. Ruth Loaring-Clark Mainord, in her review for The Jackson Sun, described it as "a delight" and write that the reader will "feel that he is living with her characters rather than reading about them."
Writing for The Anniston Star, Barbara Hodge Hall noted that "the North Carolina portion of The Scotswoman does not live up to the promise of the earlier chapters," but attributed this more to "the sometimes disappointing turn of history itself" rather than ant technical or stylistic failings by Fletcher. Hall gave the book a positive review, arguing that Fletcher's departure from her usual formula was "one which many readers will find more than welcome." The Boston Globe offered, sympathetically, that Fletcher may have been out of her depth when tackling a project of this scale:
Kathleen Graham, writing for the Regina Leader-Post, was more dismissive: "Far too many incidents in The Scotswoman follow the tried and true pattern of the historical novel. By the time the most interesting part of the plot is reachedâÂÂthe part played by the Scottish settlers in the War of IndependenceâÂÂit is too late âÂÂone is anaesthetized [sic] by the background." The review in The Hamilton Spectator allowed that The Scotswoman had "its stirring moments" but dismissed it as an "inflated, gaudily-jacketed historical romance, whose ultimate and deserved destiny, if it is lucky, will be a motion picture."