A raw and affecting memoir about a mother and daughter who beat the odds together.

Decades before Perdita Felicien became a World Champion hurdler running the biggest race of her life at the 2004 Olympics, she carried more than a nation’s hopes—she carried her mother Catherine’s dreams.

In 1974, teenage Catherine is determined and tenacious, but she’s also pregnant with her second child and just scraping by in St. Lucia. When she meets a wealthy white Canadian family vacationing on the island, she knows it’s her chance. They ask her to come to Canada to be their nanny—and she accepts.

This was the beginning of Catherine’s new life: a life of opportunity, but also suffering. Within a few years, she would find herself pregnant a third time—this time in her new country with no family to support her, and this time, with Perdita. Together, in the years to come, mother and daughter would experience racism, domestic abuse and even homelessness, but Catherine’s will would always pull them through.

As Perdita grew and began to discover her preternatural gifts, she was edged onward by her mother’s love, grit and faith. Facing literal and figurative hurdles, she learned to leap and pick herself back up when she stumbled. This book is a daughter’s memoir—a book about the power of a parent’s love to transform their child’s life.

The author will donate a portion of her proceeds from My Mother’s Daughter to The Denise House, an emergency shelter in Oshawa, Ontario, that supports abused women and their children—and that helped Perdita and her family in 1987. Learn more about The Denise House at www.thedenisehouse.com.

The Author

PERDITA FELICIEN is an author, television host, sports broadcaster, two-time Olympian, ten-time National Champion and the first Canadian woman to win a World Championship gold medal in track and field. During her career as a 100-metre hurdler, she earned numerous honours, including Canada’s Athlete of the Year and the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal. Felicien retired from professional sports in 2013 and is now a broadcast journalist. She is a member of CBC’s broadcast team and has covered multiple international sporting events including the 2016 Summer and 2018 Winter Olympic Games, and was inducted into Athletics Canada’s Hall of Fame. My Mother’s Daughter is her first book.