Fascinating insight. As a Scot who would love to move to Catalan in the future I found this book highly interesting and very informative to read. Was good to read about the history and culture. I learned a lot

A readable history book from a competent writer.

Thank you to NetGalley and to the publisher for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

FASCINATING book that I've been recommending to folks since I finished it! I appreciated the exploration of these two cultures in juxtaposition.

Although not born in Scotland I have lived there for many years and have tried to gain an understanding of its history and culture reading extensively such writers as John Prebble, Jenny Wormald and Tom Devine. In contrast to this my understanding of Catalan history is unfortunately rather sparse centering almost exclusively on its involvement with the Spanish Civil War. Now after reading J H Elliot's timely, academically well researched and very accessible account of how the nationalist movements in Scotland and Catalonia have drawn on their interpretation of history and culture to present their separatist case in the referendums of 2014 and 2017 respectively I now feel that I have a far deeper appreciation of what are two complex stories.

The historical similarities and differences between Scotland and Catalonia are explored in detail, these include the importance of the Reformation and the subsequent religious conflicts that resulted from this in Scotland whereas the Roman Catholicism of Catalonia differed little from the rest of the Iberian Peninsular and the important part that language plays in the life and culture of Catalonia whereas English was almost universally practised in time by the Scots and has played little part in the nationalist debate. But underlying everything the two main differences I would argue was firstly that whereas Catalonia was incorporated into Spain by force in the case of Scotland it was (although some may argue) a consented union. The second main difference was that since 1745 with the obvious exception of Ireland, Great Britain has experienced a level of political stability not afforded to Spain which was beset by often violent disruption leading to the catastrophe of the civil war in the 1930's. However as the book points out since the 1970's and 1980's both have been on a similar trajectory leading to the question of independence being put before its populace, although one was constitutional and legal and one lacked the required legitimacy leading to its inevitable suppression.

This is a scholarly work as evidenced by the extensive bibliography and although the writer's own view can be discerned in the epilogue I believe it is balanced and fair. The problem with a referendum with a binary question is that it trivialises and seeks to minimise complex questions to which the voter often feels they have a lack of information and knowledge to make a rational judgement so this book can not but add to that volume of work that seeks to add some degree of perspective and historiology to the independence debate. I would certainly recommend this book to those who like to look behind the newspaper headlines.