What We May Be — Gretchen Craig

In 1720, the French King heeded his Louisiana settlers' pleas for women. In Book I, Here Will I Remain, the first voyage of the New Hope carried women gathered from the prisons and asylums of Paris. In Book II, What We May Be, the brides-to-be grew up in convents and orphanages. Whatever their lives in France, however, the wilderness demands all of their courage and hope to build new lives in a new world. Giles Travert needs to find a wife among the young women fresh off the boat from France. He asks, he's rejected, and he asks yet another, but the women see his three little children trailing behind him and turn their smiles elsewhere. The only woman who really enjoys his children, and perhaps even him, is not available. Ever. Sister Joelle's heart's desire is to take her final vows to become a professed nun. Meanwhile, her mission is to shepherd the young women who have come to wed French settlers. After a sheltered life in the convent, she finds Louisiana challenges her, excites her, and baffles her. What is she really meant to do in this New World? The women from the earlier voyage of the New Hope are now wives facing even greater challenges than finding a husband. Marie Claude, already widowed, desperately wants a baby. Catherine, the daughter of an aristocrat, is deeply in love and happy with the poor farmer she married, until a letter arrives from France calling her home to her life of luxury and ease. In the exotic wilderness of Louisiana, new and old arrivals search for the age-old goals of love, honor, and happiness.