Outlander Book Club: Go Tell the Bees That I Am Gone Chapter 52 breakdown

Just the Outlander chapter

The chapter starts with Jamie getting the letter from Cleveland. It’s a request, that’s not really a request. Jamie needs to find a way to get out of it. He could tell Cleveland the truth about keeping an eye on Cunningham, but that isn’t a good idea. He also thinks about pretending that he didn’t get the letter.

In the end, he decides to send a bottle of whiskey with the excuse that the barley needs harvesting if they want whiskey for the next year. That does the trick.

The barley harvesting is also a great way to keep others away from Cleveland’s call to join the militia and weed out the local Loyalists. This allows Jamie the time to train them. This is going to be important when it comes to the Revolutionary War reaching the backcountry and with Cunningham on Fraser’s Ridge.

I love how Jamie tends to figure out the best way to handle tricky choices. He weighs up all the options, and he’s gained enough experience over the years to figure out which one is best. Not always, of course, since he is human, but in the majority of cases, he can do it.