Old Mortality, Complete

Scotland, 1679. The Covenanters bleed for their faith in a land ruled by iron and incense. Henry Morton, a young man of mixed sympathies, finds himself trapped between a royalist grandfather's granddaughter and a people sharpening their swords against religious tyranny. This is "the killing time" - when praying could get you shot and hiding your Bible could get you hanged. Yet the novel belongs to Old Mortality, the mysterious gravedigger who travels Scotland on foot, repairing the tombstones of martyred Covenanters and keeping their memory alive when all official history demands they be forgotten. Scott weaves a narrative where political conviction collides with personal desire, whereModerates and fanatics alike claim God's banner, and where one man's attempt to stay neutral becomes impossible. The result is historical fiction that pulses with life, action, and the uncomfortable truth that choosing no side is itself a choice.