METIS BEACH

Hollywood, 1995. Screenwriter Roman Carr is at the peak of his career. The series he's written, In Gad we Trust, has met with tremendous success. Naturally, whenever you achieve great success, you're sure to make enemies. However, in Roman Carr's case, his enemies are especially nasty. His series, which satirizes evangelical churches, has attracted antagonism from Christian fundamentalists. When one of the characters compares God to a mafia boss, even the producers of the show protest. You can't say things like that, they claim -"It's anti-American!" So, is Roman Carr, a U.S. citizen for the past 20 years plus, an enemy of the nation? True, his real name is Romain Carrier, and he grew up in the Fifties in the small village of Métis in the Gaspé region. At the time, Métis was not one but two villages. There was the French-Canadian village with its modest houses, all-powerful Church, and strict moral code. And there was Metis Beach, the English-speaking village where perfectly trimmed cedar hedges hid from view opulent villas in which wealthy English Canadians spent summer. The English lived differently. They held garden and tea parties where it was the whisky that flowed freely. Metis Beach was a playground for the golden youth of the era, who emulated James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause and bit lustily into all forbidden fruits. In his fascination with this crowd, Romain gets his fingers burnt and must flee from Métis. He jumps on a bus to New York, where he starts a new life. His real life. Claudine Bourbonnais was born in Montreal. Since January 1990, she has been a journalist for the CBC's French network. Since 1995, she has anchored and hosted news and current event shows on specialty news channel RDI. Métis Beach is her first novel.