• Rilla Askew turns her literary talents in a bold, commercial direction. Kind of Kin features an irresistible mainstream voice and socially conscious themes. It perfectly balances deeply felt emotion with the often hilarious storytelling and lightning-fast pacing that have made the novels of Kathryn Stockett, Fannie Flagg, Rebecca Wells, Sue Monk Kidd, and Mark Childress beloved bestsellers.

• In 2007, Oklahoma enacted the harshest legislation against illegal immigants in the nation, only to be eclipsed by Arizona two years later, and then by Alabama in 2012. Kind of Kin explores this controversial contemporary issue through the lives of charmingly earthy, true-to-life characters readers will identify with and root for.

• Askew has been nominated for the PEN/Faulkner Award, the Dublin IMPAC Prize, and isa three-time recipient of the Oklahoma Book Award. She received the 2009 Academy Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
 
 
 

“Wonderful . . . Askew’s unflinching portrait of a family whipsawed from within and without is a story for our time. It’s proof of Askew’s flat-out genius that Kind of Kin is merciless, yet strangely full of mercy.” —Ben Fountain, author of Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk

All of Cedar, Oklahoma, is shocked when Bible-believing Bob Brown and his friend, Pastor Jesus Garcia, are tossed in the county jail for hiding a barn-full of Mexicans. Thanks to an ambitious blonde state legislator and her politically shrewd husband, it’s a felony to harbor an undocumented immigrant in the Sooner State.

It’s bad enough that her Christian daddy is a felon, but now John Brown refuses to defend himself, creating a mess of trouble for his daughter, Sweet. She’s got enough on her hands caring for her husband’s bedridden elderly great-grandfather, and trying to keep her son, Carl Albert in line. Now, she’s got her ten-year-old nephew Dustin to worry about, too. A quiet and thoughtful boy, Dustin hasn’t had it easy. His mother is dead, his older sister Misty Dawn is looking for her recently deported husband, and Carl Albert beats up on him. Sweet is trying to hold it all together, but the more she tries to fix things, the faster her life unravels. When Dustin disappears and Misty Dawn shows up with needs of her own, Sweet’s sense of guilt and responsibility drive her to desperate actions that test her family, friends, and neighbors in unexpected and revealing ways.

A story of self-serving lawmakers and complicated lawbreakers, Christian principle and political scapegoating, Rilla Askew’s funny and poignant novel explores what happens when upstanding people are pushed too far—and how an ad-hoc family, and ultimately, an entire town, will unite to protect its own.