'Waverley' is the story of a naive young Englishman, Edward Waverley, sent to the Highlands of Scotland in 1745 to join the army of the ruling Hanoverian King preparing to fight the invading force of Charles Edward Stuart, pretender to the British throne. Once there, he meets the committed Jacobite clan chief Fergus MacIvor and his beautiful and no less zealous sister Flora. Carried away by the romance of the situation and his dawning love for Flora, Waverley changes sides, throws in his lot with the Jacobites and goes off to fight for the cause.
Scott vividly evokes the wild and dramatic Highland setting and gives us a wide variety of well-realized characters, from the wild clansmen to comic characters like 'Daft' David Gellately. We also have our hero getting into various sticky situations, a love quadrangle, striking set-pieces such as the battle at Prestonpans and the tragic and moving conclusion to the story.
'Waverley' has been called the first historical novel. Scott was perhaps the first to realistically portray past societies, and to show the effect of historical change on individuals. Here the ancient ways of the Highlands are about to be changed forever.
Highly recommended, for itself and as 'the one that started it all'.