Little Gale Gumbo

Table of Contents

 

 

 

 

 

 

PRAISE FOR

Little Gale Gumbo

“Spicy, delicious, and filled with surprises,
Little Gale Gumbo
is a wonderful stew, a debut novel that will fill you with joy. Put it on your reading menu and enjoy!”

—Adriana Trigiani,
New York Times
bestselling author of
Don't Sing at the Table
and
Big Stone Gap

 

“I loved this novel like crazy. With its irresistible settings—from New Orleans to an island off the coast of Maine—unforgettable characters, and heartfelt exploration of love, family, and secrets,
Little Gale Gumbo
is one of my favorite novels of the year.”

—Melissa Senate, author of
The Love Goddess' Cooking School

 

“Seamlessly shifting in time to reveal the layers of a mystery, this is a poignant story of an unforgettable family bound by secrets, fierce love, and a dash of voodoo. The Bergeron sisters will stay with you long after you leave Little Gale Island. Erika Marks is shining new talent, and she has written a novel full of heart and grace.”

—Rae Meadows, author of
Mothers & Daughters

“Built on a roux of charm, intrigue, and family secrets, Erika Marks delivers a savory blend of romance and suspense, bringing New Orleans to Maine in a delectable debut novel.”

—Sally Koslow, author of
With Friends Like These

NAL ACCENT

Published by New American Library, a division of

Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto,

Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

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Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices:

80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

 

First published by New American Library,

a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

 

First Printing, October 2011

Copyright © Erika Marks, 2011

Conversation Guide copyright © Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 2011

All rights reserved

REGISTERED TRADEMARK—MARCA REGISTRADA

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA:

Marks, Ericka.

Little Gale Gumbo/Erika Marks.

p. cm.

ISBN : 978-1-101-54503-4

1. Mothers and daughters—Fiction. 2. Restaurateurs—Fiction. 3. Fathers—Crimes against—

Fiction. 4. Family secrets—Fiction. 5. Maine—Fiction. 6. Domestic fiction. I. Title

PS3613. A754525L58 2011

813' . 6—dc22 2011024541

 

Set in Cochin LT STD

 

 

Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

 

PUBLISHER'S NOTE

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

The recipes contained in this book are to be followed exactly as written. The publisher is not responsible for your specific health or allergy needs that may require medical supervision. The publisher is not responsible for any adverse reactions to the recipes contained in this book.

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There was never anything magical in the gumbo. At least, nothing you could see. From the peanut butter–brown roux to the slender rounds of her sliced okra, Camille Bergeron made her gumbo the very same way her Creole mother had made it in her own kitchen for nearly forty years. But then, Camille should have known that a single woman from New Orleans with caramel skin couldn't arrive on the cold and quiet shores of an island in Maine in 1977 and expect to blend in, especially not with two teenage daughters in tow and a carpetbag that smelled of boiled crawfish, no matter how many times she'd hung it out.

Erika Marks x

So it was no surprise to Camille when she opened the doors to her Little Gale Gumbo Café that the islanders eyed her suspiciously over their soup spoons, even as they clamored for second and third bowls of her trademark Creole stew. It had killed them, she suspected, to admit how good her gumbo was, nearly broken them to find themselves addicted overnight to such a simple confection as a praline, charging through snow and rain to buy a brown bag of those shiny bronze disks that melted on your tongue like good bourbon.

You might have asked native islander Ben Haskell what Camille put in her gumbo to make it so special, but he would never tell. From the moment Camille and her daughters had appeared on his weathered porch to inquire about an apartment for rent, Ben's routine and guarded world was never the same.

His teenage son, Matthew, would have been of even less help, having been equally enchanted by Camille's girls, soft-spoken Josephine and headstrong Dahlia: passions that would follow him for years, no matter how hard he tried to let them go.

Because just as anyone enjoying a good gumbo could never bear to relinquish it until the bowl had been tilted and the last silky spoonful had been scooped from the bottom, so it was for all the men who fell in love with the Bergeron women, those too good and those much too bad. Letting go was never easy.

Part One

First you make the roux.

One