The Last Moon Novel

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The Last Moon is a historical novel by author DeAnn Lubell-Ames based on the 1902 eruption of Mount Pelee.

Plot synopsis

The novel is based 95% on true historical characters and events.

Three fictional characters, wealthy French plantation owner Marcel Chevalier, his beloved but troubled son Andre, and his beloved strong-willed mulatto daughter Yvette, are at the heart of this miniseries. Their long-simmering family drama plays out even as the real Mount Pelee and the island’s society are on the edge of an eruption.

The story opens with dashing 34-year-old Captain David Cabot as he sails to the island of Martinique on May 8, 1902. As his crew and passengers are having an ordinary day at sea, Captain Cabot’s crew spies a horrific sight.

The ship’s path is littered with rotting corpses of humans and animals. Captain Cabot, one of the men vying for the heroine Yvette’s forbidden affections, prays that Mount Pelee has not erupted.

The catalyst for the Chevalier family drama is really the suicide of Andre’s unstable mother, Eveline, and Andre’s vow to get revenge on those w ho made her suffer: his father Marcel, his half-sister Yvette, and Yvette’s mother Nicole (who dies of smallpox).

Andre’s and Yvette’s history is littered with violence, bullying and torment, particularly during one critical scene in which the thirteen-year-old Yvette shoots the racist Andre at a lurid brothel, Maison des Chats, to prevent him from trying to rape her best friend Indigo as part of his plan to hurt Yvette and Marcel.

Yvette is sent away to France for six years for her own safety—when she returns, the racial, geological, political and family tensions have changed dramatically.

In a move that shocks the elite society of Martinique, at a grand welcome-home ball, Marcel appoints Yvette, a woman of color, to help run the family plantation. Andre’s desire for revenge intensifies as he becomes politically active in an election that will determine the future of the island.

Unfortunately his political activities are centered on his white supremacist gang, Blancs Pour Blancs (Whites for Whites). This rabble is set to do battle with the blacks, mulattoes and sympathetic whites on the island that are not happy with the way people of color are treated (even though women of color have some position and power), as well as a black voodoo group called quimboiseurs that supposedly can raise the dead and think that the rumblings of their volcano, Mount Pelee, mean that the gods are angry with the whites.

Mount Pelee’s eruption unleashes the terrible fury of nature on this French colony despite the corrupt politicians’ attempts to deny what is happening. The Progressive Party typified by Andre, and redeemed a bit by Fernand Clerc, just wants to hold on to power and are afraid a volcanic disaster will empower their Radical Party opponents led by a black senator. The local newspaper is in bed with the party in power and outright deceives the public.  This just makes things worse and hurts the antagonists in the end.

The volcano doesn’t spare anyone, good or evil, black and white. Although the corrupt politicians get their due, the good characters also die.

One of the most terrifying sequences is a scene in which Cyrillia, Yvette’s half-sister and Indigo’s child by Marcel, gets overpowered by a flood of centipedes and ants that, because of natural disaster, invade like this Biblical plague.  This five-year-old child, the next generation, is utterly helpless before waves and waves of these insects—and she’s being hunted by her other half-sibling, Andre, who resents Marcel making Yvette and Cyrillia his heirs to the plantation.

Earthquakes, floods, sinkholes, mudslides, hunger, homelessness, refugees, social unrest, snake attacks…Mount Pelee unleashes all this on an unprotected population. The politicians and corrupt media prove their cowardice, and our heroes prove their strength. Fernand Clerc speaks for the people. Especially the Chevalier family and the heroine Yvette.

It’s a race against time for Yvette and Marcel to save their plantation by getting their banana crop harvested and off the island as the volcano wreaks havoc on everything in its path and the island is isolated from the world.

Yvette finds her world turned upside down by the volcano and people around her as she falls in love with not one but two men—Captain David Cabot and the handsome black stable master Stefan—even though her first love is the island and her home. She does have a passionate love scene with Stefan in an Eden-like setting—Martinique is definitely a symbol for Eden and Andre is the serpent.

As Andre’s way of life crumbles, he takes his fight directly to his family and goes on a brutal rampage through the family mansion, killing and wounding. When he threatens Indigo and Cyrillia, Yvette sacrifices herself and submits to him trying to rape her. Marcel finally has the strength to confront his son, but in the end it’s Cyrillia, a.k.a. Mini-Yvette, and Yvette who kill Andre. These are warrior women.

Their troubles aren’t over, however. The volcano explodes, reducing the entire town of St. Pierre to rubble and killing 30,000 people as well as devastating the northern part of the island. Yvette, Indigo and Cyrillia survive to build a new future, Indigo and Cyrillia in Paris, Yvette on the island she so dearly loves, and Cyrillia already dreaming of returning to Martinique.

Characters

Fictional

Character	Description
Marcel Chevalier	Head of the Chevalier family. Husband of Eveline and later Nicole. Father of Andre, Yvette, and Cyrillia (by Indigo). Part of a successful island family that has roots in Arles and Paris, France, where he meets his first wife, Eveline. His family are prominent landowners in Martinique, including in Basse-Pointe and Le Robert, and of course Marcel owns the Chevalier banana plantation in St. Pierre near the Roxelane River. Marcel attempts to make his tormented marriage work but frequently absents himself to take care of plantation business--and, eventually, to carry on a love affair with Nicole. He is helpless at nurturing his young son Andre, but devoted to Yvette, his daughter by Nicole. Forward-thinking in terms of race relations, he clashes with Eveline, who loathes people of color except for the housekeeper Henrillia. Because Eveline instills that same hatred in Andre, the rift between Andre and Marcel grows, despite Marcel's guilt over Eveline's suicide that allows him to excuse much of Andre's behavior. Marcel's punishment and indulgence create conflict with Andre. Marcel emerges as a flawed character who has a brief dalliance with his daughter's older friend Indigo when she comes of age and Yvette is away at school in Paris. Marcel doubts the severity of the danger from Mount Pelee but not the need for social reform and racial equality in Martinique.
Eveline Madeline Chevalier (nee Montcalm)	Estranged wife of Marcel Chevalier, mother of Andre. She is a society belle from Arles, France. Although she is haughty and prejudiced against people of color, her isolation in Martinique and the snobbery of the elite as well as Marcel's own family make her somewhat sympathetic. Completely devoted to her young son Andre, she nevertheless plays twisted games with him, for example "Ladies Teatime," in which he cross-dresses and answers to the name "Nanette". When she forces Andre to drink champagne and he develops alcohol poisoning, Marcel is forced to send her away, but she refuses to go quietly and kills herself in front of young Andre.
Andre Chevalier	Tormented artist, bisexual, son of Marcel and Eveline Chevalier, half-brother to Yvette and Cyrillia. His mother Eveline plays bizarre dress-up games with him. He studies art in Arles and Paris with Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Vincent Van Gogh and Paul Gauguin. Andre draws disturbing images such as a bleeding rose and rejects the Atelier Cormon's staid ideas about art and chooses the Académie Julian. The irony of Andre's bohemian and iconoclastic lifestyle is that out of his hatred for blacks and mulattoes--especially his half-sister--he desperately tries to hold on to the island's elite and corrupt power structure, of which he is a part. He and Mount Pelee are mirrors of each other as objective correlative symbols; Andre is a human volcano, but also has a tender side, as when he memorializes his dead lover Daniel and treats Tattoo, a prostitute at Maison des Chats, one of St Pierre's many brothels, with tenderness during a session of lovemaking, then weeps over her when she dies in an earthquake tremor.
Nicole Chevalier (no maiden name given)	Black porteuse (female porter of goods) in Morne Rouge. She quits her trade when she marries Marcel Chevalier. Mother of Yvette Chevalier. Dies of smallpox. Marcel begins an affair with her once his passion cools for his unhappy wife, Eveline, who detests the island. Object of Andre's revenge, even after her death and his return from Paris--he simply transfers all his hatred to her daughter, Yvette (if it's possible for him to hate Yvette even more than he already does.) Strong and graceful porteuse who encourages Yvette to learn self-defense and courage. Nicole is grateful that Yvette will never have to work as a porteuse.
Yvette Chevalier	Heiress to Chevalier Plantation, daughter of Marcel and Nicole, half-sister of Andre, and cousin to Paul Chevalier. She is an expert hunter of wild boar and has an interest in horticulture. Her most stunning feature is the apple green color of her eyes, a recurring literary motif that reflects the Garden of Eden-like nature of Martinique. Like her friend and adopted sister Indigo, she is a fille-de-couleur, a mulatto. Yvette wants to run the family agriculture business, shipping bananas all over the world. Although she is more comfortable in trousers than in a dress, while her friend Indigo yearns for designer clothes, Yvette is not a hoyden. Indigo likens her to the island itself, suggesting that Yvette's connection with nature is deeply spiritual. Despite her attraction to Stefan that results in an idyll of lovemaking, Yvette becomes interested in David Cabot. She finally braves her fears and confronts Andre once and for all when he attacks Indigo during his rampage. As the new head of Chevalier Plantation after Marcel's death, she breaks up with Stefan because the white landowners, whom she needs to work with, will never accept their relationship. However, she still keeps company with David Cabot, enjoying a liaison from time to time.
Indigo (no last name given)	Beautiful mulatto daughter of the washerwoman Honorine, who had an affair with a sailor, "a slightly built man from Denmark with sandy hair and the deepest blue eyes." (p. 47) At the age of twelve, Indigo is fostered with the Chevaliers and lives with them. "This is a common practice in Martinique," Yvette explains. "Mulatto girls and boys are often reared as members of prominent families." (p. 47) Indigo is a fille de couleur--a woman of color, highly prized on the island yet misunderstood, according to Lafcadio Hearn. She learns the hotel business from Yvette's cousins Roger and Caroline, and later opens her own successful hotel, Hotel Indigo, on Rue Bouille. She writes poetry and sketches.
Cyrillia Chevalier	Half-sister and niece of Yvette. The child of Marcel Chevalier and Indigo, who carried on a forbidden romance during Yvette's absence in Paris. Cyrillia comes to live with the Chevaliers at Yvette's insistence, but she never quite understands that Yvette is her half-sister even though Cyrillia is Yvette in miniature. "she is so much like you," Indigo says. "Too much like you." (p. 275) Spirited and spunky, she defends her mother, aunt, and father from Andre's climactic rampage.
Aza	A kindly old woman who practices white voodoo, worshipping the Bon Dieu. She reminds one of Tia Dalma in the "Pirates of the Caribbean" films. She is deeply psychic and has visions of future events, including Indigo being sold to a brothel as part of Andre's revenge against Marcel and Yvette. Aza delivers Cyrillia and takes care of both Indigo and the child in Morne-Rouge until Yvette invites the women to live in the Chevalier mansion. Before Aza can escape with Indigo and Cyrillia to Paris, Aza sacrifices herself to protect Cyrillia from the fury of ants and centipedes.
Maxi	Boyhood friend of Marcel who becomes his head hunter/provisioner and teaches Yvette how to hunt and shoot. His wife, Coralline, is a Christian. The descendant of slaves transported from Senegambia to Martinique, Maxi stayed on the plantation after the Code Noir, the French slavery law, was repealed. He survives the bite of a fer-de-lance but dies seven years later during a hunting expedition when Mont Pelee's rumblings grow more violent.
Coralline (no last name given)	Maxi's devout Christian and devoted wife who acts as a lady's maid to Yvette and likes to sing the biguine song Maxi serenaded her with during their courtship: "Ti fenm la doux--li doux," which translates to "Sweeter than syrup the little woman is!" (p. 252)
Henrillia (no last name given)	The fierce Chevalier family cook who has a soft spot for young Andre and can calm his rages when no one else can. in addition, she gets along with his mother Eveline, who trusts her despite Henrillia's loyalty to Marcel. Henrillia exerts such a strong will that Marcel muses, "Dear Henrillia, after twenty-five years of loyal service to this family, I wonder which one of us is in charge here--you or me?" (p. 145)
Captain David Cabot	Captain of the American steamship Silver Eagle who hails from Boston. The son of an upper-class shipping family, David falls in love with Martinique--and in particular Yvette Chevalier, whom he first meets when she is thirteen. Because of a friendship between Marcel's grandfather Jacques and David's grandfather, Marcel and David become friends. When David realizes Mont Pelee along with Soufriere has exploded, he sails to help with the rescue effort. Fond of cigars and a motherly English singer named Ginger from Liverpool, David also forms a bond with Indigo, who calls him ma free americaine--her American brother.
Stefan	A young stowaway on board the Silver Eagle who becomes a stablehand at the Chevalier plantation and battles his forbidden longings for Yvette until the threat of death from Mount Pelee's wrath gives him the courage to woo her. Stefan comes from Dominica and aspires to a better life in Martinique.
Yebe	A voodoo priest who, as Aza does, practices white magic and explains to Yvette that he, like the Fon people in Nigeria, believes in a heavenly father called the Gran Met, who is assisted by the loa. The heroic Yebe defends the Chevalier family with his spiritual protection.
Madame Rose	Gaudy but shrewd proprietress of Maison des Chats who has affection for Andre Chevalier. Madame Rose is not your stereotype of a madam with a heart of gold. Rather, she is a canny businesswoman. During the destruction of St Pierre, she counts her take for the day--one of her last acts before she drowns in a flood, The last things she sees are "a severed head, a donkey cartwheel, a splintered rum barrel, a black girl with red ribbons in her braids, a yellow cat with no tail, and the fifty-year-old blue sign from the local mercantile store." (p. 219)

Historical

Character	Description
Leon Compere-Leandre	A local cobbler who becomes famous for surviving the destruction of St. Pierre in the cellar of his home.
Louis-Auguste Cyparis	Listed as Auguste Ciparis in the novel. His name also appears in history as August Cyparis or Louis-Auguste Cyprus. A prisoner in the St. Pierre prison. At nineteen he is slated to be executed because he has "strangled the white man who treated him no better than a dog." (p. 186) After the unrest in St. Pierre and an uprising at the prison, Governor Mouttet orders him kept safe out of harm's way as "my ace in the hole for the election." (p. 211) Mouttet pardons Ciparis as a way to curry favor in the election. Auguste Ciparis escapes the destruction of St. Pierre because he is in an underground cell. In the novel's epilogue, Yvette tells Indigo of his fate in a letter: "He was discovered after surviving in his underground solitary confinement cell for three or four days suffering with second and third degree burns. He received a pardon and will be traveling to America to become a sideshow act with the Barnum and Bailey Circus." (p. 281)
Father Alte Roche	Jesuit priest and amateur volcanologist who predicts the eruption of Mount Pelee and opposes the political and religious elites on the island that downplay the dangers. At the end of the novel he watches the destruction in horror and weeps for St. Pierre. Historically this is accurate, for he was "weeping for a town that was about to die...the glowing rock was 'in direct line with St. Pierre.'"
Fernand Clerc	Politician and landowner in Martinique. Friend of the Chevalier family. His wife is Veronique. Close friends with the Chevalier family. Despite his outsider status--he is not one of the Families of Ten--he gains momentum as the Progressive Party candidate, largely on account of his "leniency towards his laborers" and also because "he is one of the few white men trusted by both sides." (p. 127) Andre Chevalier and Governor Mouttet dislike him, but realize he is the best candidate to defeat Senator Amedee Knight, whom they dislike more.
Governor Louis Mouttet	The corrupt "fat cat" governor of Martinique. His home base is the governor's mansion in Fort-de-France. He conspires with scientists such as Professor Landes, members of the ruling class known as the Families of Ten, Progressive Party officials, Mayor Fouche and Marius Hurard of Les Colonies to deny and minimize the imminent eruption of Mount Pelee. His wife is socialite Maria Coppet Mouttet.
Amedee Knight	Martinique Radical Party senator running for island-wide election in 1902. He is a Black candidate, anathema to the ruling elite--in particular Governor Mouttet and Andre Chevalier. Amedee Knight was "an honored graduate of the Ecole Centrale in Paris." Upon his return to Martinique after graduation, he was elected assistant mayor and then secretary of the Chamber of Commerce, "only to be appointed president of the town council." (p. 125) In his post as island senator, he is not content to rest on his laurels. In the 1902 election he runs for the deputy seat in the northern arrondissement of Martinique and gains "popularity not only with the people of color but with some of the liberal whites as well."
Andreus Hurard (also Hurand)	Editor of Les Colonies who puts political and racial agendas over journalistic integrity and has a crisis of conscience after the damage is done. Not related to the founder of Les Colonies, politician Marius Hurard.
Thomas Prentiss	US consul to Martinique. According to records: Born in Waitsfield, Washington County, Vt., June 17, 1844. Served in the Union Army during the Civil War; U.S. Consul in Seychelles, 1871-80; Port Louis, 1880-94; SAINT Pierre, 1900-02, died in office 1902. Killed in the volcanic eruption of Mount Pelée, when a fast-moving cloud of ash and hot gases covered about eight square miles, killing an estimated 30,000 people, in St. Pierre, Martinique, May 8, 1902 (age 57 years, 325 days). Thomas and his wife, Clara, are in Martinique as "observers" (p. 149), although Clara would like to take a more active role and denounce the injustices she sees on the island. The Prentisses are good friends with Marcel and Yvette Chevalier. Both Thomas and Clara die during the destruction of St. Pierre. Although they cannot directly influence local politics, Thomas and Clara provide a sympathetic ear for the Chevaliers, Father Roche, Fernand Clerc, and Rene Cottrell.
Clara Prentiss	Wife of Thomas Prentiss who opposes the power structure on the island but is limited in what she can do because of her husband's role as an observer. "I love this island and her people," she says. "There is much suffering going on because of a few stuffy men and their relentless quest for power. Do you think for one minute they really care anything about the people? All they care about is their money."
Rene Cottrell	An heir of the Cottrells, one of the Families of Ten. He bucks the system, or attempts to, by joining with the Chevaliers, Father Roche and Fernand cleric in their efforts to sound the alarm about evacuating St. Pierre. His Achilles' heel is his love for Colette, but he puts principle above passion.
Colette De Jaunville	Rene Cottrell's betrothed and the daughter of one of the elite Families of Ten. A spirited girl who ultimately does not understand why Rene insists on postponing their engagement party when the eruption of Mount Pelee seems imminent.
Families of Ten	The island's ruling class and social elite--the Aubreys, the Hayots, the Guerins, the Jannes, the De Jaunvilles, and the Cottrells. They willfully ignore the threat posed by the growing social unrest and the volcanic eruption.
Eugene Guerin	One of the Families of Ten, a doctor by trade, he owns the Guerin sugar plantation targeted by Julie Gavou and her fellow carrier women after an earthquake kills field workers cutting and harvesting sugarcane. Guerin prepares to evacuate his family--wife Josephine, sons Eugene and joseph, daughter-in-law Sarah, English nurse Mary Goodchild from Lowestoft, housemaids Marie and CeCe from Dijon, and the family cook. A wall of lava mud obliterates the plantation and kills the Guerins, as well as all the workers, as they make their escape.
Julie Gabou/Gavou	Carrier woman, "formidable young woman with the athletic body of a man: strong, agile, and tall." She leads a strike against the Guerin plantation after her husband is killed in an earthquake while working in the fields on Sunday, the Sabbath day, to harvest the crops before the lava and toxic gases destroy them. Julie thinks that "forcing people to work on the day of the Sabbath was a mortal sin against God. There must be restitution." (p. 211)

History of the Novel

Photo of DeAnn Lubell

Lubell told Heidi Simmons, a writer for the Coachella Valley Weekly who profiled Lubell for the Coachella Valley Women's Issue, ""The story found me, I didn't go seeking it. The way the story unfolded over the years, I knew it had to be written and I was the only one who could do it...I love adventure and I love stories...I like discovering interesting stories, finding out what makes people tick, what makes myself tick. Using words, I like to make people laugh and cry."

In 1968 DeAnn Lubell, an 18-year-old student at Western State College in Gunnison, Colorado, found the book The Day the World Ended in the Gunnison city library.

Lubell often says in her lectures on Mount Pelee, "I came across a book that recounted the true story of the eight days preceding the 1902 eruption of Mt. Pelee, a volcano located near the coastal town of St. Pierre on the Caribbean island of Martinique.   The more I read, the more enraptured I became with the colorful characters of St. Pierre during that historical period.  The breathtaking descriptions of island life was beyond belief: the deep political corruption; the exquisite stature and beauty of the mulattoes; the power and wealth of the whites; the frustrated American ambassador; the extraordinary costumes; the outrageous waterfront area; the lively brothels; the unseeing clergy; the prolific plantations; the attack of the mutant ants and centipedes; the tidal wave of poisonous snakes; the voodooist and their anger, the devastation of natural disasters; and finally the awesome force of the volcano." Her YouTube video narrated by actress Elaine Church, shows her fascination with the Martinique of the period and the eruption of Mount Pelee.

The book told of a wealthy white plantation owner by the name of Fernand Clerc who was running for a top political position on the island at the time.  It had been very important to the French government that elections be held at any cost.   The opposing political party had a black candidate who was gaining rapidly in popularity.  To make sure the elections would not be postponed, the government devised an elaborate and convincing plan to deceive the people of Martinique about the safety of the volcano.  On the day before the elections, Mt. Pelee erupted, and in less than four minutes, 30,000 individuals perished in a cloud of hot gas.  There was nothing left of beautiful St. Pierre.  It had been reduced to a moonscape.  Fernand Clerc and his family managed to escape in time.

This story so intrigued Ms. Lubell-Ames that she decided then and there that someday she would write an historical novel about this event; but not before she had actually visited the island. However, for nearly twenty years she could not make such a trip.

In 1987, Lubell-Ames and her then-husband Joseph Lubell were selling their home in Boca Raton, Florida. One day a buyer viewed their home and brought a friend, Yves Clerc, who reminded Lubell-Ames of the French actor Maurice Chevalier. In conversing with Clerc, Lubell-Ames was astonished to discover he was from Martinique, and further, that he was the grandson of the historical Fernand Clerc. He invited Lubell-Ames and her husband to visit Martinique. Six weeks later, Yves Clerc gave Lubell-Ames and her husband a tour of the island, as well as introducing them to one of the leading island historians. Lubell-Ames spent two weeks gathering information and testimonies, and going on private tours of the ruins of St. Pierre. She returned home and wrote the novel, which she self-published in 2010.

Lubell has ideas for a sequel, but is more focused on developing The Last Moon as a movie or possible miniseries, and as of this writing is the PR rep for an independent film being shot in Palm Springs.

Critical Reception

Reviews

Local TV-10 host Pattie Daly Caruso, mother of Carson Daly, on "Valley Views" on February 7, 2015 interviewed label about her 20 years of local public relations and told Lubell that her book has done "so, so well. I'm so proud." The May 2010 issue of Palm Springs Life featured an article called "Word Association" that reported the novel "remains true to facts and personal testimonies and features characters who are composites of real people from that time and place."

When The Last Moon debuted in 2010, Midwest Book Review wrote:

A riveting read from first page to last, "Last Moon Summary" is a novel set against the 1902 eruption of Mount Pelee on the West Indies island of Martinique that resulted in the death of some thirty thousand people and the seaport town of St. Pierre consumed by fire. An impressive historical novel, author DeAnn Lubell has paid careful attention to detail and accuracy with respect to historical facts including the Creole language spoken there, the culture, lifestyles, geography, and the geological phenomena that occur with respect to the eruption of a volcano. Against this superbly presented background is an engaging story of lust, greed, corruption, and murder, as well as friendship, love, sacrifice, faith, hope--and survival. Deftly written from beginning to end, and available in both a hardcover and a softcover edition, "The Last Moon" is very highly recommended for community library historical fiction collections.

The 2010 Annual Desert Writers' Issue of the Sun Runner highlighted the Midwest Book Review's commentary. Other critical reviews followed.

The saga — replete with forbidden love, corruption, mass murder, bravery, sacrifice, survival, and hope — remains true to facts and personal testimonies and features characters who are composites of real people from that time and place.--Palm Springs Life May 2010

Awards

• Honorable Mention, Historical Fiction, 2011 Royal Dragonfly Book Award
• Finalist, Da Vinci Eye Award, 2012
• Honorable Mention, General Fiction, Hollywood Book Festival, 2012
• Honorable Mention, General Fiction, 2015 Paris Book Festival
• Books&Authors.net Award for Literary Excellence
• Amsterdam Book Festival 2016, History Winner

References

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