Blood Kin

Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers

There are no innocent bystanders in Blood Kin, a bold and strikingly fresh literary page-turner about the aftermath of a military coup in an oppressively hot, nameless country. First-time author Dovey fuses the precision of an anthropologist with a poet's sensuality in the distilled prose of this short, wondrous novel.

A brutal dictator is overthrown and imprisoned in his summer residence
along with his wife and others, including his portraitist, barber, and
chef. Each of the three men has served him with humility, loyalty, and
most of all, skill. Will they face execution by the conquering rebels merely for associating with his cruel regime? Or are they somehow complicit in the president's dictatorial sins?

The voices of the three servants and three of their women -- the portraitist's pregnant wife, the fianc