Winner of the Ruth Schwartz Award

Jeanne Chatel has always dreamed of adventure. So when the eighteen-year-old orphan is summoned to sail from France to the wilds of North America to become a king's daughter and marry a French settler, she doesn't hesitate.

Her new husband is not the dashing military man she has dreamed of, but a trapper with two small children who lives in a small cabin in the woods. With her husband away trapping much of the time, Jeanne faces danger daily, but the bravery and spirit that brought her to this wild place never fail her, and she soon learns to be truly at home in her new land.

Suzanne Martel was born in Quebec City and educated in an Ursuline convent. She and her sister, Monique Corriveau, spent their childhood making up stories about a vast and adventurous family that lived in New France. These stories became the source of Suzanne's adult writing as well as that of her sister, who was also a noted Quebecois novelist.

Suzanne Martel's profile page

• Winner, Ruth Schwartz Children's Book Award