Cath-Lit Live: To Crown with Liberty

Amy J. Cattapan interviews Karen Ullo about her new book, To Crown with Liberty.

"Cath-Lit Live!" features brief interviews with Catholic authors who are releasing new books. Hosted by Catholic author and speaker Amy J. Cattapan, "Cath-Lit Live!" gives viewers a glimpse into the latest Catholic books while getting to know a bit about the author as well. 

To Crown with Liberty by Karen Ullo

New Orleans, 1795. In the wake of the French Revolution’s Reign of Terror, Alix de Morainville Carpentier—a former lady-in-waiting to Marie Antoinette, now married to her gardener—seeks peace and security in the Spanish colony of Louisiana. But her journey into the man-eating swamp called Attakapas reopens the wounds of her old life in France. Alix is forced to reckon with the choices that saved her life at the cost of her honor—and perhaps her soul. In revolutionary France, the Old World is dying; the quest for liberty, equality, and fraternity has become a nightmare where the price of dissent is blood. In the wilderness of Spanish Louisiana, a new civilization is beginning to emerge—but in this budding New World, the slave trade perpetuates the systems of oppression that sparked the revolution. Caught between old and new, scarred by trauma and grief, will Alix ever find a home where she can truly be free? To Crown with Liberty is a historical novel based on riveting legends from George Washington Cable’s Strange True Stories of Louisiana (1888).

Karen Ullo is the author of Jennifer the Damned, Cinder Allia, and To Crown with Liberty. She's the editorial director of Chrism Press and served for more than three years as managing editor of the Catholic literary journal Dappled Things. She holds a MFA in screenwriting from the University of Southern California and is the winner of the 2023 Louisiana Author Project sponsored by the public library system.

You can catch "Cath-Lit Live" live on A.J. Cattapan's author Facebook page. Recorded versions of the show will also be available to watch later on her YouTube channel and Instagram.

Copyright 2024 Amy J. Cattapan
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