Spooky OUTLANDER moments

As Halloween approaches, I've been thinking about some of the spookiest, scariest, most eerie or supernatural moments in the OUTLANDER books.

For example:

  • Claire's encounter with Otter-Tooth's ghost in DRUMS
  • Margaret Campbell, the catatonic screaming woman in VOYAGER, speaking with Brianna's voice during the scene with the crocodile
  • Jamie's ghost in OUTLANDER

Do you have a favorite scary moment from the series? Or maybe not so much scary, as unexplainable by anything other than supernatural means?

Diana Gabaldon has had her own real-life encounters with ghosts. If you haven't seen her Alamo ghost story before, it's worth reading.

And speaking of ghost stories: In the scene in VOYAGER that takes place on Halloween night, just before Claire goes back through the stones, Claire and Roger discuss an old Scottish folk tale that had Roger scared out of his wits as a young boy. Rychane on Compuserve tracked this story down for me a couple of months ago.

Happy Halloween/All Hallows Eve/Samhain to all of you! <g>

5 comments

Diane M. said...

Karen,

What a great topic!

I have another one that always chills me: The story of Gavin Hayes and the tannasg he met. Ian and Claire lean over their cups of ale as Jamie, with Duncan to help, tells the story of "a time in the late, cold autumn in the highlands, just as the season turns, and the feel of the air tells ye the ground will be shivered wi' frost come dawn." (DOA - Chapter 1)

I shudder like Jaime does at the telling of that tale!

The following scene in Chapter 2, "In Which We Meet a Ghost" continues with the creep factor, up until Bonnet's pale figure emerges from the wagon bed! Yikes!

Diane

Karen Henry said...

Diane:

Oh, definitely! That story is not one I'd want to read (or be listening to) on Halloween. <g>

And if someone can come up with a LOGICAL, RATIONAL, NON-SUPERNATURAL explanation for how Claire's shoes ended up on the doorstep of the cabin in DRUMS, I would be amazed. <g> I'm not a very superstitious person myself, but that whole episode almost makes *me* believe in ghosts.

Karen

Kemara said...

One scene that gives me chills every time I read it is in Drums of Autumn. Claire and Jamie are spending the night on what will become Fraser's Ridge. Claire feels something brush her shoulder and thinks it was Jamie...but he's on the other side of the fire!
"Jamie? Jamie, is there someone behind me?" Or words to that effect. ::Shiver:: Good thing she ducked!

Mitzi H. said...

I just listened to the scene in The Fiery Cross where Jamie and Claire meet Fannie Beardsley. The story she tells Claire about the Beardsley’s first 3 wives being buried in the woods, but his 4th wife Mary Ann being buried under the Rowan Tree…and that wife‘s “ghost“ coming to her under a full moon and talking to her and helping her escape Beardsley’s beatings….Pretty Creepy!!!

Karen Henry said...

Diana has just posted on her blog a version of the Alamo ghost story.

It may be a little different from the version on Compuserve that I linked to above (or maybe not -- I didn't compare the two), but it's still a great story, very suitable for Halloween. <g>

Karen

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