Perfect for those interested in the early history of Louisiana, this novel has been meticulously researched and features a number of fascinating voices from the time on the French colony.

Thanks to NetGalley and Harper Books for the digital galley of this book.

Based on a true story, this book follows four women from their departure from Paris, 1720 to New Orleans and beyond. They are to become wives to settlers in Louisiana. For the next 15+ years, they live hard lives, getting married, having children (or not), losing husbands and children, all while crossing each others’ paths periodically.

This book was very well researched, a realistic epic that follows the ups (few) and downs (many) of life in Louisiana. If you’re super into historical fiction and the inner lives of women, definitely check it out. It’s It well-written with rich characterization, but it just wasn’t one that was super interesting to me. If I hadn’t been doing the audio version (shoutout to Libro.fm), I probably would have DNFed it.

This book tells a unique story that is rarely touched upon in early colonial America. Young French girls were Imported to America for a specific purpose.
The girls experience resonated from the pages and gives an angle of American colonial history that is often unexplored.
I thought this book did a good job. It was a bit slow in spots but overall the story is truly one needs to be told.

First time reader of Julia Malye here - Her Pelican Girls tells a vivid and potent story of women first discarded by society then sent as brides to shore up the floundering colony of La Louisiane in America. These courageous women survived unbelievable hardship to create new lives in the New World.

My thoughts: This is a stand-out novel for its historical details surrounding African slavery, the native Natchez people, the conflicts between the French and natives, the growth of New Orleans, the visuals of the Louisiana swamplands in a virgin land, and especially these formidable women. Its a sad tale of what women had to endure.

In this 346 page book, Mayle covers 14 years. The girls and women have signed up to leave a Paris “hospital,” which houses orphans, criminals, those deemed mentally ill, and others disowned by their families. They are hoping for a new start–and yet, they have no idea what that really means. No one tells them what is coming, no one helps them. They must live it, moment to moment, with nothing to prepare them for this brave new world.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Harper for a novel about love–love between women, who care deeply and tenderly for each other as they go through horrible trials that almost break their bodies and minds. But through it all, they are unfailingly loyal to each other, in a way that, it strikes me, only women can be.

DNF at 50%. Readers who are ready to sink into an immersive, sweeping historical story about a lesser known part of women's history. While this is under 400 pages, it did feel like it was longer than it was, and I personally had a hard time connecting with the changing viewpoints and events.

This beautifully written and compelling novel is based on the true story of a shipful of young French women who were sent to the United States in 1720 to be brides for the settlers.

Pelican Girls tells a vivid and potent story of women first discarded by society then sent as brides to shore up the floundering colony of La Louisiane in America. These courageous women survived unbelievable hardship to create new lives in the New World.

La Salpêtrière, founded by Louis XIV in 17th-century Paris, was a large compound housing women and girls in severely inhumane conditions – a prison for criminals, a reformatory for the mentally ill and undesirables, and an orphanage of forsaken children. Overcrowding at La Salpêtrière prompted sending some prison inmates to a New France colony in America. In 1720, Governor Bienville of La Louisiane no longer wanted criminals sent to the New World, but reformed and repentant fertile women and young orphans as brides.

Primarily, we follow three women over the next 14 years from the long voyage on La Baleine to La Louisiane, to their expected marriages, and building their new lives in an inhospitable land – Geneviève, imprisoned for performing abortions; Pétronille, confined by her rich family as an “unsatisfying woman”; Charlotte, abandoned as an infant, now thirteen years old. Two other women enrich the narrative: Etiennette, Charlotte’s friend from the orphanage, and Utu’wv Ecoko’nesel, an indigenous Natchez young woman.

Be it the whims of nature, the cruelties of men, or their own internal conflicts, the strong bonds these women forge help them endure and survive. Romantic love between two of the women gives a poignancy to the story. There is a certain rhythm to Malye’s stylized writing that takes getting used to, and vague plot details will eventually come into focus, so read on. This is a stand-out novel for its historical details surrounding African slavery, the native Natchez people, the conflicts between the French and natives, the growth of New Orleans, the visuals of the Louisiana swamplands in a virgin land, and especially these formidable women.

Historical Novels Review, February 2024

In the 1700's a ship left Paris, France carrying young girls and women from prison to the far off shores of La Louisiane. Genevieve, Petronille, and Charlotte find themselves in a strange land married to men they had never met. Julia Malye's Pelican Girls takes the reader on a journey of courage and perseverance as these 3 women fight to survive the hot, damp, diseased swamps of early Louisiana. This is a great work of fiction based on a real event.

2.5 stars. I really wanted to like this book, but it was just not engaging. The chapters were entirely too long, and I could not connect with any of the characters.