Bride of New France A Novel

Transporting readers from cosmopolitan seventeenth-century Paris to the Canadian frontier, this vibrant debut tells of the struggle to survive in a brutal time and place. Laure Beausejour has been taken from her destitute family and raised in an infamous orphanage to be trained as a lace maker. Striking and willful, she dreams of becoming a seamstress and catching the eye of a nobleman. But after complaining about her living conditions, she is sent to Canada as a , expected to marry a French farmer there. Laure is shocked by the primitive state of the colony and the mingling of the settlers with the native tribes. When her ill-matched husband leaves her alone in their derelict hut for the winter, she must rely on her wits and her clandestine relationship with an Iroquois man for survival.

" is a haunting story of a courageous young woman, shipped over from France to the wilderness of Canada in the 17th century. Beautifully written, Suzanne Desrochers uses the rich detail of the time period to tell us of Laure's remarkable bravery and determination and to remind us again of the resilience of our forbearers." Kathleen Grissom , author of The Kitchen House

A Canadian bestseller, this richly imagined novel is about a young French woman sent to settle in the New World.

Suzanne Desrochers, of French Canadian descent, has conducted extensive research on the filles du roi and is writing a PhD thesis at King's College London on the migration of women to America. She lives in Toronto.