The Pelican Bride
May 4th, 2014. Filed under: This & That.The Pelican Bride
By Beth White
She’s come to the New World to escape a perilous past. But has it followed her to these far shores?
It is 1704 when Frenchwoman Geneviève Gaillain and her sister board the frigate Pélican bound for the distant Louisiana colony. Both have promised to marry one of the rough men toiling in this strange new world in order to escape suffering in the old. Geneviève knows life won’t be easy, but at least here she can establish a home and family without fear of persecution for her outlawed religious beliefs.
When she falls in love with Tristan Lanier, an expatriate cartographer-turned-farmer whose checkered past is shrouded in mystery, Geneviève realizes that even in this land of liberty one is not guaranteed peace. Trouble is brewing outside the fort between the French colonists and the native people surrounding them. And an even more sinister enemy may lurk within. Could the secret Geneviève harbors mean the undoing of the colony itself?
ISLAND BREEZES
In 1704 the Pelican brides were an early form of mail order brides. They were brought from France to Louisana to wed the men who were stationed in and around Fort Louis.
Most of these brides were orphans, but at least one of them was running from a French prison.
Genevieve decided this would be her only way to escape. She wanted to be a bride, but not to just anyone. Unfortunately, she is falling in love with the only man who doesn’t want a bride.
It gets right down to the wire as Commander Bienville has decreed that if she doesn’t marry in the near future he will cut off the funds and she’s on her own.
Fortunately she does have a skill and chooses not to marry anyone if she can’t have the man she wants.
But that’s not all. There’s mystery and intrigue in the making as well as treason.
This was a bit of history I’d not yet visited. Thank you, Ms White for taking me there. I’m looking forward to the second book in the Gulf Coast Chronicles.
***A special thank you to Lanette Haskins for providing a review copy.***
Beth White’s day job is teaching music at an inner-city high school in historic Mobile, Alabama. A native Mississippian, her passion is writing historical romance with a southern drawl. Her novels have won the American Christian Fiction Writers’ Carol Award, the RT Book Club Reviewers’ Choice Award, and the Inspirational Reader’s Choice Award. Learn more at www.bethwhite.net.