Blood Brothers in Louisbourg
Publisher: Cape Breton University Press
Published: 2012
Place of publication: Sydney, NS
Format: Paperback
ISBN-13: 9781897009727
Description: As the son of an officer, Jacques was expected to pursue a career in the military. In the spring of 1744, at the age of fifteen, Jacques and his father leave France for Louisbourg, the French capital of Île Royale, where Jacques would learn the military arts – a far cry from his books and music and the comforts of his mother’s home.
     In the Acadian forests that surround the French fortress of Louisbourg, a young Mi’kmaw man named Two-feathers watches the comings and goings of soldiers and citizens whose strange ways are a constant source of wonder. Two-feathers is hoping to find his father who, he has been told, is an important man among the French – they have never met.
     Jacques’ life in Louisbourg is a curious mixture of military duties in the unfamiliar and harsh environment, and frequent visits to the Governor’s apartments where he is teaching the beautiful young daughter of a visiting merchant to play the violoncello.
From his discreet camp outside the walls of the fortress, Two-feathers lives off the land and watches the French, believing that he will know his father when he sees him. At night, he moves silently about the city, including the apartments of the Governor, where he befriends a beautiful young woman. The story culminates in the violent siege of Louisbourg in 1745.