Synopsis
Past connects to present, mystery combines with romance, and cultures unite in this novel of historical fiction. Accomplished communications professional Lou Ashby travels from Montreal to Paris to find the thread that links her to her French ancestry, unaware of events running parallel to her search. In fact, historian Geoffroy Le Hideux is investigating a mysterious find at the Élysée, the official residence of the president of the French Republic, but also the former home of a woman who had a far-ranging influence on her era. Fate brings Lou and Geoffroy together, and they work with friends and family from both sides of the Atlantic to unlace the secret ties that bind her to one of France’s most famous and infamous historical figures.
Marie-Josée Poisson
Photo credit: Vadim Daniel
Marie-Josée Poisson has been writing since she was a young girl. When she chose communications as a profession, her writing work became more focused on tools like press releases, articles, ads, speeches, web content and promotional material. Before becoming a full-time novelist, Poisson spent three years working in an advertising agency in Dubai and then returned to Quebec to take on senior level communications roles at TV5 Monde and the École supérieure de ballet du Québec.
This was followed by five years as editor-in-chief of Le Magazine de la Place des arts, the publication of Montreal’s largest venue for cultural events. Ultimately, she left her career to focus on her dream of writing a novel—and ended up writing three of them. Passionate about history, she spent five years researching and writing the first novel in her Liées par le sang series, a trilogy focused on well-known historical figures and investigations into their genealogies. Blood Bound: Unlacing Secret Ties is the first novel in this trilogy to be translated into English.
Marie-Josée Poisson
Translated by
Flora-Lee Bendit
Flora-Lee Bendit has been a language specialist for over 35 years, wearing many hats as translator, revisor, editor, proofreader and business writer. Blood Bound: Unlacing Secret Ties, her first literary endeavour, has allowed this logophile to express her passion for creative translation and verbal art. She continues to work as a freelance French-to-English translator, and volunteers as a literacy tutor.
First Pages
At a glance
Emmanuel Obein, master craftsman, didn’t come to the palais de l’Élysée alone. The little red-haired man was accompanied by a colleague who specialized in restoring period floors. The decoration work in the salon Pompadour had provided the ideal opportunity to refresh the wooden parquetry, which had not aged well. Emmanuel’s primary task had been to straighten a pillar. However, when he had inspected the site the week before, he had concluded that he would have to remove the column in question to reinforce the anchorage that secured it to the structure. The handiwork was shoddy and unworthy of a place like this. “A job half done is as good as none! The people who installed this had no clue what they were doing,” Emmanuel had thought.
With infinite care, taking great pains not to touch the other decorative elements, he had therefore proceeded to extract the fluted pillar, embellished with gold motifs, and the wood panel that had hidden its foundation. Still, before he could continue with this project, the floor had to be stripped with steel wool and coated with hot beeswax the old-fashioned way. As the site supervisor, he was responsible for overseeing the project early the next morning.
This specific treatment for eighteenth-century flooring was just one of the many time-honoured techniques that Emmanuel took pride in mastering to perfection. As a maître compagnon, he felt he had been entrusted with a mission to perpetuate French savoir-faire, born of the great traditions to preserve the heritage of the decorative arts. Whether refinishing for the Vatican a baptismal font in Varennes porcelain without altering the original pigments, reproducing thousands of imperial bees with a chiqueteur brush and gold leaf on a ceiling at the École militaire de Paris, refurbishing from top to bottom a residence in Limousin that belonged to Lafayette, or restoring to its former glory an entrance to the royal palace in Madrid, he was equally in his element. No matter how vast or how delicate the task, Emmanuel undertook it with all his science and art. His talent had garnered him the prestigious title Meilleur ouvrier de France, and from there, had seen him named Meilleur ouvrier d’Europe.
It therefore wasn’t surprising that he was the one summoned to the most pre-eminent building in France. The palais de l’Élysée was growing old. In some ways, the presidential palace resembled an aging lady who needed constant care to retain her former splendour. This time, it was the marquise de Pompadour’s parade room, now known as the salon Pompadour, that had required his attention…
Reader reviews
Eva Stachniak
Bestselling author of The School of Mirrors
What if Madame de Pompadour’s son survived, left France for Québec, and has modern day descendants? Marie-Josée Poisson’s novel delights with its deft mixture of historical sleuthing, romantic entanglements, and the hazards of unexpected fame.
Victor Suthren
Former Director General of the Canadian War Museum, Ottawa
Marie-Josée Poisson is an accomplished writer who depicts the reality of past society so completely that she moves with effortless grace through its personalities, drama and events, and takes you by the hand with her. She captures the heart and spirit of the Baroque era so beautifully that she surrounds the reader in its romance with delightful ease. A master story-teller.
Rebecca Morris
Author of Other Maps
Like a French-Canadian Da Vinci Code, Marie-Josée Poisson’s novel spans oceans and generations, combining a glamorous Québec woman’s identity quest with a gripping historical mystery that reaches the highest echelons of French society. Meticulously researched, filled with memorable characters and vivid settings, Unlacing Secret Ties explores the burdens and the blessings of an extraordinary inheritance.
