Patrimony: A Novel

During the turbulent sixties, the call for Quebec independence created a political and social maelstrom in Canada. For nearly ten years, riots, bombings, labor strikes and violent street scenes—many even worse than what we’re seeing today—were part of everyday life in Montreal, the epicenter of battle. PATRIMONY represents the essence of that still-smoldering conflict. Told from the viewpoints of two brothers and a sister, PATRIMONY is about what happens in a country when political ideology resorts to terrorism. It’s about what happens in a family when one brother believes in responsible political action to achieve his goals, and the other brother, a time-bomb ticking toward an explosion, will do anything to get what he wants, including using his own sister for blackmail. From PATRIMONY’S opening chapter, a trip to North Carolina where brother and sister buy explosives from gunrunners, to a factory bombing and a symbolic attempt to blow up a bridge, the plot moves quickly. It weaves through cultural differences, family and political conflicts, and ends in an unprecedented political crisis—Quebec under martial law.