Pelican Bride [strong] [/strong]

White (Crescent City Courtship) takes liberties with historical fact in this inspirational and sweet historical romance. Readers are introduced to the lives and times of the “Pelican Girls,” brides brought to the New World’s Gulf Coast in 1704 to help begin the colonization process. While little is known about the actual Pelican Girls, aside from what is contained in church records, the fictionalized ladies are brought to life in a sanitized, genteel fashion. Genevieve Gaillain, a young Frenchwoman, arrives in Louisiana with her sister, both as mail-order brides, in hopes of building new lives better than those they’re escaping in Old World France, where they suffered from religious persecution. Their journey intertwines with that of the Native Americans and other colonists in a convoluted web of lies, deceit, and sin, challenging Genevieve to stay true to her faith, herself, and her new husband. New France comes alive thanks to intricate detail, though the effect is tempered by the sheer volume of secondary characters and Byzantine plot. [em](Apr.) [/em]