The Dead Don’t Bleed

From the doomed coalfields of north-east England to sun-bleached southern Spain, two brothers confront each other and themselves to overcome their family legacy

Set against elemental landscapes - the dying coalfields of Northumberland and the barren wastelands of Andalusia - The Dead Don't Bleed is an unflinching exploration of fraternal rivalry, family trauma and the lasting effects of a violent patriarchy.

Frank Bridge turned his back on his family's gangland conflicts in Northumberland decades ago. His brother, Gordon, fled to Spain with the proceeds of a disastrously botched robbery and has not been heard from since. Frank's life has taken a different path to the same sun-bleached landscape- he fell in love with Lorca's poetry and the woman who brought it to him.

But when their gangster father, the head of their savage dynasty, dies, Frank feels he must track down Gordon and tell him that their father's reign of terror is over. Can Frank's appearance after twenty-five years prompt a truce - a reconciliation even - will his arrival merely be the catalyst for more turmoil and brutality?

Taut, elegiac, violent and beautiful, Neil Rollinson's debut novel is about how family can make or break us. Beneath the scorching, pitiless Andalusian sun, the two brothers are finally brought together for one last reckoning.