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A Brother's Blood: A Novel
Coming to America to investigate the suspicious death of his brother, a German POW during the war, Wolfgang Kallick joins forces with Libby, a local spinster, to uncover the truth about the death, but the case becomes complicated by the murder of Libby's brother
336 pages, Paperback
Published January 1, 1997
13 people are currently reading
207 people want to read
About the author
Michael C. White
22 books43 followersAuthor of Resting Places
One woman’s journey of self-discovery and spiritual awakening
After receiving the devastating news of her son’s death, Elizabeth ekes out a lonely and strained relationship with her husband, Zach. While he takes comfort in support groups, Elizabeth becomes withdrawn and seeks solace from the only thing that helps her forget: alcohol. A chance meeting with a man on the side of the road spurs her to travel cross-country to the site of her son’s death in the hope of understanding what had happened.
During the trip, she undergoes a transformation, one which allows her to confront the demons of her past but also to acknowledge the possibilities of her future. Through the wisdom and kindness of a man she meets along the way, she finds a means not only of dealing with her pain and her guilt, but of opening herself to the redemptive power of love, and of faith in something. Resting Places is an inspiring, upbeat story, a tale of real faith in what we cannot see except with our hearts, a novel that follows a character from despair to hope, from despondency to renewal.
One woman’s journey of self-discovery and spiritual awakening
After receiving the devastating news of her son’s death, Elizabeth ekes out a lonely and strained relationship with her husband, Zach. While he takes comfort in support groups, Elizabeth becomes withdrawn and seeks solace from the only thing that helps her forget: alcohol. A chance meeting with a man on the side of the road spurs her to travel cross-country to the site of her son’s death in the hope of understanding what had happened.
During the trip, she undergoes a transformation, one which allows her to confront the demons of her past but also to acknowledge the possibilities of her future. Through the wisdom and kindness of a man she meets along the way, she finds a means not only of dealing with her pain and her guilt, but of opening herself to the redemptive power of love, and of faith in something. Resting Places is an inspiring, upbeat story, a tale of real faith in what we cannot see except with our hearts, a novel that follows a character from despair to hope, from despondency to renewal.
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Displaying 1 - 28 of 28 reviews
January 5, 2014
Like many books, I began A Brother’s Blood with no knowledge of its storyline. I may have had some idea when I first added it to my TBR shelf, but that was long and many books ago. Of course, I couldn’t help noticing the “NY Times Notable Book” blazing across the front cover, but that’s just advertising, right?
Well, in this case it’s a pretty fair assessment of the writing and quality of what you will find inside. Even if you are a hardened genre-specific reader, you may discover this book enchanting you until the last page. One of the great things about talking with other readers, or sharing ideas and thoughts about books here on Goodreads is that you are tempted to (or do) pick up works that may not be a natural selection, but broaden your tastes. During the past decade I have made a conscious effort to be more of an omnivore reader and I have been rewarded for doing so. This book is one such reward and after I post this review I will re-discover which Goodreads member caused me to TBR it. I thank you in advance.
You could say that this is a quiet book. It is most certainly not a fast-action, bang-up, shoot-‘em-up novel. It does have events and actions of course, but they are woven into the fabric of the story in a way that life itself tends to do. It also has secrets that lie both in the past and the present, but I would not call this book a mystery novel. I think it is simply a well-written, well-designed story that the protagonist lives through.
While I am not a middle-aged woman living in rural Maine, the experiences of this first-person narrator resonated with me. Although she experiences many common emotions, she is calm and deliberate. As her present becomes mixed with an unpleasant past, she is guided by her familial obligations, her basic goodness, and her determination. As we journey with her we see how the shadow of the past has afflicted those alive then and now.
I think that this book covers just the right amount of time and detail. As I was finishing it, I thought that I would have wanted to know more about a couple of plot turns, but two days later, I now believe that more would have merely diluted things. From start to finish this book flowed along holding my interest and imagination. I was able to guess a couple of points, but rather than be disappointed I found that it heightened the tension and drew me into the story more. I’m not sure whether we should credit the author or his editor, but they walked a fine line of expectation and mystery there and it was very, very well done.
If you are not much for character-driven, introspective stories you might decide to pass by this novel. I think that you will have missed out on something that is worth reading. If you, like I, read whatever is good (or at hand sometimes) and can appreciate good writing, then you will enjoy this. Four (4.0) Stars.
September 25, 2009
Compelling mystery, with an unlikely narrator, set (as are the best) in the human heart.
February 6, 2012
This was a very good book - similar to Winter's Bone. I found it very interesting how Michael White was able to write so effectively in a woman's voice.
July 6, 2012
Vivid descriptions enable the reader to discover the cold, dreary, late-winter Maine climate. A Brother's Blood is filled with dark characters, most of whom carry baggage from imperfect lives and dreary surroundings.
The story flows well. Backflashes are professionaly executed as Libby recounts events from her past. The plot is fairly transparent, but the writing and despair keep the reader engaged.
The story flows well. Backflashes are professionaly executed as Libby recounts events from her past. The plot is fairly transparent, but the writing and despair keep the reader engaged.
August 3, 2018
PROTAGONIST: Libby Pelletier, general store owner
SETTING: Maine
RATING: 3.5
WHY: Back in 1945 there was a POW camp for Germans set up in rural Maine. The inhabitants were assigned to work with the local logging industry. The American foreman was Ambroise Pelletier. It’s 46 years later, and Wolfgang Kallick has come to America to try to find out more about his brother, Dieter, who supposedly escaped from the camp and drowned. He turns to Ambroise’s daughter, Libby, who is reluctant to help. The characters are all well done, and I especially liked how the relationships between the Germans and Americans were depicted with the recognition that most of the prisoners were just boys with only a few diehard Nazis in the bunch. Where the book went wrong for me was in the conclusion when a character goes into a detailed description on what happened in 1945. There didn’t seem to be any reason for him to do that other than to finish the story. Overall, White is a fine writer though.
SETTING: Maine
RATING: 3.5
WHY: Back in 1945 there was a POW camp for Germans set up in rural Maine. The inhabitants were assigned to work with the local logging industry. The American foreman was Ambroise Pelletier. It’s 46 years later, and Wolfgang Kallick has come to America to try to find out more about his brother, Dieter, who supposedly escaped from the camp and drowned. He turns to Ambroise’s daughter, Libby, who is reluctant to help. The characters are all well done, and I especially liked how the relationships between the Germans and Americans were depicted with the recognition that most of the prisoners were just boys with only a few diehard Nazis in the bunch. Where the book went wrong for me was in the conclusion when a character goes into a detailed description on what happened in 1945. There didn’t seem to be any reason for him to do that other than to finish the story. Overall, White is a fine writer though.
October 23, 2016
One of many episodes in the history of the United States that was kept under wraps at the time and is still widely unknown is that approximately 425,000 German prisoners of war were imprisoned on American soil in over 30 states during World War Two and made to work until the war was over. In the state of Maine several camps housed over 4,000 prisoners who worked in the lumber industry, on farms harvesting potatoes and other crops, or in repairing roads and bridges. A Brother's Blood uses the background of one of these camps to weave a mystery that engages the past and the present. I'd have liked more of the past ... but I do love that it spurred my to do some research.
April 19, 2020
Good story of a past crime and a single Maine woman’s search for truth. Involves German prisoners in Maine during WW II and the present. Somewhat like foreign mysteries I have seen on TV but very well written.
November 19, 2023
This book is beautifully written, with a lot of depth. I’m always a sucker for semi-historical novels, and of course mysteries, so this was a great recipe for me. The ending was a little weak for me, but overall a very engaging book.
July 22, 2017
I know that when I'm not busy being an Immortal Poet, I'm a small-minded pedant; but I do wish I hadn't encountered, "He cuts a piece of steak, runs it through the egg yoke."
May 9, 2020
Maine, a nazi and a crime long hidden
August 15, 2021
Great mystery
August 30, 2022
Another piece of US history I did not know about. This is a great thing about reading historical fiction.
Powerful book about secrets within a family that no one wants to talk about. Libby is a very strong independent woman.
Powerful book about secrets within a family that no one wants to talk about. Libby is a very strong independent woman.
September 23, 2025
This was a slow beginning and hard to start, then once I got into the book it was hard to put down!
September 1, 2014
Nearly a half-century ago there was a POW camp near the small Maine town where Libby Pelletier lives, the German prisoners being employed as loggers for the local paper mill. Libby's logger father Ambroise was one of the main overseers of the prisoners; she and her kid brother Leon both worked briefly at the camp. Her memories of that time are dim, but she does recall one of the prisoners escaping and being found, months later, in a local lake.
Leon is now an alcoholic; she brings him back home yet again from the hospital hoping that this time for once he'll stay dried out. And there's a visitor in town, a German, Wolfgang Kallick, whose younger brother Dieter was the young man who escaped. Wolfgang isn't satisfied with the explanations he's had of how Dieter died, and is hoping even after all these years to find the truth. Libby strongly suspects that indeed there's a truth to be told, and that Leon knows what it is. But then Leon receives a mysterious phonecall one winter's night and goes out to meet someone whom he refuses to name to Libby; the following morning he's found frozen to death with a gash on his forehead. The inquest verdict is accidental death, that he fell off the wagon and collapsed, but Libby is unsure of this -- and even more so when she starts getting threatening phonecalls warning her not to cooperate with Wolfgang . . .
Being Libby, she needs no greater encouragement than the threats to start assisting Wolfgang in any way she can.
This is a literary thriller of great writerly ambition, and for the most part it succeeds. White conveys superbly the feel of a Maine winter -- since I was reading the book during a hot summer, it came as quite quite a mental dislocation, whenever I put the book down, to find myself not in a wintry chill but a swelter -- and until the denouement, which seems a tad rushed, the deliberate pacing is hypnotic.
I was especially impressed by the way he wove together present events with those of nearly fifty years ago; it's common in novels facing this challenge to solve the problem crudely, giving the two timelines alternate chapters, but White instead manages to meld the two into what's essentially a single account. One of his stratagems is to use the present tense for Libby's ongoing story, and it's here that the writing comes occasionally unstuck; in these sections there are annoying uses of the pluperfect where really the perfect or imperfect is indicated. (It seems that US writers in particular have this problem when writing in the present tense. I'm not sure why this should be.) The intermittent misuse of a tense might seem a trivial objection, but each time it happened I was jolted out of the tale.
Luckily it didn't happen too often, though, and overall I liked A Brother's Blood very much indeed. I bought this book in the late '90s when I lived in the UK, and for some reason I just never got round to reading it until a few days ago. It was worth waiting for.
Leon is now an alcoholic; she brings him back home yet again from the hospital hoping that this time for once he'll stay dried out. And there's a visitor in town, a German, Wolfgang Kallick, whose younger brother Dieter was the young man who escaped. Wolfgang isn't satisfied with the explanations he's had of how Dieter died, and is hoping even after all these years to find the truth. Libby strongly suspects that indeed there's a truth to be told, and that Leon knows what it is. But then Leon receives a mysterious phonecall one winter's night and goes out to meet someone whom he refuses to name to Libby; the following morning he's found frozen to death with a gash on his forehead. The inquest verdict is accidental death, that he fell off the wagon and collapsed, but Libby is unsure of this -- and even more so when she starts getting threatening phonecalls warning her not to cooperate with Wolfgang . . .
Being Libby, she needs no greater encouragement than the threats to start assisting Wolfgang in any way she can.
This is a literary thriller of great writerly ambition, and for the most part it succeeds. White conveys superbly the feel of a Maine winter -- since I was reading the book during a hot summer, it came as quite quite a mental dislocation, whenever I put the book down, to find myself not in a wintry chill but a swelter -- and until the denouement, which seems a tad rushed, the deliberate pacing is hypnotic.
I was especially impressed by the way he wove together present events with those of nearly fifty years ago; it's common in novels facing this challenge to solve the problem crudely, giving the two timelines alternate chapters, but White instead manages to meld the two into what's essentially a single account. One of his stratagems is to use the present tense for Libby's ongoing story, and it's here that the writing comes occasionally unstuck; in these sections there are annoying uses of the pluperfect where really the perfect or imperfect is indicated. (It seems that US writers in particular have this problem when writing in the present tense. I'm not sure why this should be.) The intermittent misuse of a tense might seem a trivial objection, but each time it happened I was jolted out of the tale.
Luckily it didn't happen too often, though, and overall I liked A Brother's Blood very much indeed. I bought this book in the late '90s when I lived in the UK, and for some reason I just never got round to reading it until a few days ago. It was worth waiting for.
January 4, 2025
Libby Pelletier is the tough 50-something owner of a local cafe in rural central Maine -- single and self-sufficient, she banters back and forth with crusty locals she's known her whole life who come by for coffee and pie. She and her alcoholic brother Leon grew up here, parented by a rough-hewn timberman who did the best he could when their mother deserted the family for a passing fancy-man. It's the early 1990s and life meanders on, following familiar routes until one day, a mysterious visitor from Germany shows up, asking questions about the past.
It seems that during World War II, there was a prison camp for German POWs nearby. The visitor is trying to find out what happened to his brother, who died while a prisoner at the camp. This triggers flashbacks to when Libby was a young teen, and her father led the POWs in felling timber. Before long, dark events of the past start to spill over to the present as Libby tries to unravel crimes of the past and present.
This kind of back and forth in time structure is often clunky in books, but works well here. The historical stuff was really interesting -- I guess I didn't really understand the extent to which POWs were used to fill labor gaps during wartime, and that companies would lobby to get POW camps nearby. The story here seems to be based on the real-life Spencer Lake camp, where logging was done to provide raw material to a local paper mill, and several prisoners escaped.
Although the book's themes are commonplace (trauma of the past coming forth in the present, the unexpected lingering cost of all wars, etc.), it never feels too pushy -- everything is in service to the story and the characters, all of whom feel completely real. The protagonist is particularly compelling and would make a great role for a middle-aged actress should this ever get to the screen. Readers who enjoy a slow-burn mystery mixed with some history will enjoy this, and readers with a particular interest in Maine should definitely check it out.
It seems that during World War II, there was a prison camp for German POWs nearby. The visitor is trying to find out what happened to his brother, who died while a prisoner at the camp. This triggers flashbacks to when Libby was a young teen, and her father led the POWs in felling timber. Before long, dark events of the past start to spill over to the present as Libby tries to unravel crimes of the past and present.
This kind of back and forth in time structure is often clunky in books, but works well here. The historical stuff was really interesting -- I guess I didn't really understand the extent to which POWs were used to fill labor gaps during wartime, and that companies would lobby to get POW camps nearby. The story here seems to be based on the real-life Spencer Lake camp, where logging was done to provide raw material to a local paper mill, and several prisoners escaped.
Although the book's themes are commonplace (trauma of the past coming forth in the present, the unexpected lingering cost of all wars, etc.), it never feels too pushy -- everything is in service to the story and the characters, all of whom feel completely real. The protagonist is particularly compelling and would make a great role for a middle-aged actress should this ever get to the screen. Readers who enjoy a slow-burn mystery mixed with some history will enjoy this, and readers with a particular interest in Maine should definitely check it out.
July 20, 2011
I didn't know there was a POW camp in Maine for German soldiers. Based on that fact the author weaves a story that I began to think - oh, I know how this is going to play out - but in fact, was not prepared for the horrific end. Libby, who has taken care of her bother since they were children, becomes involved in the story of an escaped German soldier. Her involvement is 46 years after the fact and only after her brother turns up dead on the ice in the middle of a lake. Mob behavior, morality of war and much description of life in some very very cold areas of Maine grabbed my interest and held it. I read this in one sitting.
April 16, 2014
The books should have been better. But there were times when I just skipped some lines and chapters. The plot was good, An older woman brings her recovering alcoholic brother home to take care of, and circumstances, and dreams start her remembering the time 40 years before when she was a young teen, and there was a POW camp in her town in Maine. Another brother comes searching for the truth about his brother who died in the camp. The book just sometimes crawls. But the story is well written for all that.
January 21, 2015
Excellent mystery, but one that goes far beyond whodunit status. Flashbacks to the World War II era in Maine, where 400,000 German POWs are held and work in logging camps. Characterization is excellent. An echoing of “brother’s blood” in present, as well as past. A German comes to Maine in 1990s to find out what happened to his brother in 1945. An older woman’s brother comes home to “dry out.” He dies on the ice. She wants to find out what really caused his death (a murder and discovers it is linked to the WWII brother’s death, as well, also a murder).
February 21, 2014
This was a fine mystery story set in the remote Maine woods where there was a P.O.W. camp during WWII. 400,000 German prisoners were kept there. The action takes place decades after the war and connects the camp with a mysterious death. How are these two worlds related? Read and discover. You won't be sorry.
December 29, 2015
This is an older book (1996) and I picked it up in a used bookstore. The plot is compelling and it unfolds in layers throughout the book. This is a debut novel and a very impressive first accomplishment. I liked the characters and I liked the story. I did not guess "who did it", so it was a great read to the very end. I read it VERY quickly, which means it was a 5-star read.
April 20, 2008
During World War II, a German POW camp was set up in rural Maine. After the war, a German comes to town attempting to find out what really happened to his brother who was an escapee in the camp. The brother motif continues as the mystery is solved. Enjoyable but a bit weak at the end.
August 14, 2010
Terrific book for historical mysteries, WWII fans, and New Englanders. I enjoyed it, and didn't see a few things coming. Michael White is one of my favorites.
July 7, 2010
This was a terrific read based on the German POW camp in upstate Maine. Great story!
August 18, 2010
Loved it! I didn't know that there was a German POW camp in Maine during WWII. Great story!
February 11, 2013
I enjoyed this book. I had no idea that there were POW camps in North America during WWII so this made this story even more interesting from a historical perspective.
June 27, 2014
Interesting premise, although the writing didn't always capture my full attention.
April 18, 2016
Great narrative voice and atmosphere. First 2/3 was too slow paced.
September 14, 2023
Always a great re-read!
Displaying 1 - 28 of 28 reviews