Joanna Goodman

Quebec's Duplessis orphans, children placed in institutions during the 1940s and 1950s and wrongly certified as mentally ill so the province could draw larger federal payments, gave Joanna Goodman the material for two novels. The Home for Unwanted Girls (2018) was the earlier of the two and topped the Canadian bestseller lists. The Forgotten Daughter, published in October 2020, carries that story on: Elodie, taken from her young mother in the first book, has joined other former orphans pressing for redress, while a second strand follows Véronique Fortin, whose father was imprisoned for his part in the October Crisis of 1970, and the journalist James Phenix she falls for across a political divide, in a Quebec still arguing about separation in 1992. Born in Montreal in 1969, Goodman had four earlier novels behind her, beginning with Belle of the Bayou (Porcupine's Quill, 1998) and running on through You Made Me Love You, Harmony and The Finishing School. She lives in Toronto and runs Au Lit Fine Linens, the bedding company her mother started in 1981.