The Canary Islanders made huge contributions to Louisiana and the nation. And author Stephen Estopinal intertwines these reflections of family oral histories and local traditions into El Tigre De Nueva Orleans: A Novel from the Melilla Chronicles.

In the rural farm country south of New Orleans, Bartolome de Melilla, the trilingual grandson of a famous Spanish soldier, was raised on tales of battles against the British. Descendent of Canary Islanders transported to Louisiana in 1778 to serve as soldiers for the King of Spain, the traditions and heraldry of his ancestors were woven into the fiber of Bartolome’s being.

With America on the cusp of the Industrial Revolution, 14-year-old Bartolome is swept into the heady danger and romance of the worldly port city of New Orleans. Trusting to the lessons he was taught by his grandfather, he finds himself assisting the city’s foremost Voodoo priestess and strikes up an unlikely alliance with a Chinese businessman. He also falls in love with Anna Steward, the beautiful daughter of a mattress works owner. But with the British invasion, Anna’s family flees New Orleans and he joins the American defenders.

To survive and be reunited with his love, Bartolome will have to become El Tigre de Nueva Orleans in this masterfully written saga of love, war, and Voodoo spiritualism.