Anthology Launch: Relative Strangers

Join us for the launch of Relative Strangers: Inheritance, Identity, and the Meaning of Kinship!

Three contributors from the anthology will join us to discuss family secrets, DNA surprises, and what family really means.

About the participants:

Lisa Brenner is an actress who’s starred in many indie films. She has also produced multiple films, written and directed the award-winning short The Good Guys, as well as Merry Licemas. Most recently, she wrote, produced and stars in the comedy feature, One Big Happy Family, about her own DNA surprise.

Eve Sturges is a writer and licensed psychotherapist. She launched her podcast, Everything’s Relative, in 2019, one year after a mysterious man turned her world -- and identity -- upside down. Everything’s Relative has posted more than 100 episodes, interviewed more than 150 people, and logged over 400,000 downloads.

Don Anderson is an Emmy Award-winning television producer and editor whose work includes the documentary Brothers in Arms: The Making of Platoon. Raised amid housing projects, trailer parks, and alcoholism, he has written numerous mostly true stories about his unconventional childhood. On September 19, 2021, a DNA test revealed that the man who raised him was not his biological father. The discovery led Don to create and host Missing Pieces: NPE Life, a podcast exploring DNA surprises, family secrets, and the NPE experience.

About the book:

DNA testing and evolving adoption laws are blowing up family secrets. In Relative Strangers: Inheritance, Identity, and the Meaning of Kinship—a groundbreaking anthology curated by B.K. Jackson, with a foreword by Libby Copeland—28 intimate essays by acclaimed and emerging writers probe the profound impact of encountering unknown close relatives. These poignant stories demonstrate the healing power of truth at the same time they raise the question: what does it mean to be family?