This extraordinarily engrossing literary mystery exposes a little-known chapter of twentieth-century history - the detention of nearly 400,000 German prisoners of war in the U.S. during World War II. The landscape of rural Maine provided a surreal sort of shelter for these most reviled casualties during the war. While many prisoners served their time peacefully enough, some escaped and others - like the brother of Wolfgang Kallick - were simply reported to have died.

A Brother's Blood commences decades after the war, with Wolfgang Kallick's arrival in America to learn the details of his brother Dieter's death. When he discovers that Dieter escaped from the camp and was found dead months later, he vows to find out how his brother died. Libby, a flinty local woman who grew up during the war, is drawn into the drama, only to find that her family is implicated.

After her brother is slain, Libby undertakes her own quest for solutions to both deaths - suspecting they are somehow related - and exposes a darkness beyond her imagining.