"This outstanding account of how colonization, demonology, martyrology, and hagiography became intertwined in New France is both fascinating and instructive, providing a textured view of the beliefs and life conditions of Europeans and Indigenous people. In skilfully presenting arresting or amusing material without fanfare, Mairi Cowan takes readers on an emotional as well as an intellectual journey. Most historians cannot achieve this. The Possession of Barbe Hallay is a refreshing and engaging read." Sarah Ferber, University of Wollongong and author of Demonic Possession and Exorcism in Early Modern France
"The Possession of Barbe Hallay is structured around five concise chapters, which mirror the stages of the subject's life. Only a small portion of this woman's fifty-year life was affected by demonic possession, which is presented here with integrity, reverence, and page-turning vigour." Literary Review of Canada
"Cowan uses the quotidian details of the life of a humble female French settler to portray the evolution of the colony into a more settled, less fearful society by the end of the seventeenth century. The local story of Barbe Hallay's possession allows the author to illuminate 'the texture of everyday moments within grander historical narratives.' The close examination of her world is fascinating." Canada's History
"Through admirable research and enviable imagination, Cowan has so effectively reconstructed a time, place, and person that intrigued readers will want (and seek) more." American Religion
"Masterful research. In a tour de force that explores themes of femininity in early New France, the early modern transfer of religious and supernatural belief across oceans, and the differences between colonial ideals and settler realities, Cowan has explicated one of New France's most mysterious witchcraft cases." Journal of History
"Firmly grounded in documentary evidence reinforced by a meticulous synthesis of historiography. The Possession of Barbe Hallay is particularly significant as it contributes to important scholarship that fills the lacuna of studies on possession and witchcraft beyond the borders of western Europe."* Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft*
"Cowan amply demonstrates a society far more complex – and with far greater depth – than we might assume, given the often narrow and superficial narratives used to gloss over more than two centuries of French colonial experience in New France. The book stands on its own as an introduction to settler colonial life in the mid-seventeenth century, at roughly the halfway point in the evolution of the colony, and would make a fine history even without the narrative device of Hallay's possession interwoven throughout, leading us through a unique chapter in our history." Montreal Review of Books
"Cet ouvrage offre un portrait soigneusement détaillé – appuyé par des interprétations soigneusement présentées – de l'histoire de Barbe Hallay et, à travers elle, d'une période importante de l'histoire de la Nouvelle-France." Revue d'histoire de l'Amérique française
