The Inheritance of Joseph Chanda

What if someone could rescue you from poverty — but only by convincing you that your own life was a mistake?

Joseph Chanda has seven kwacha in his pocket, a broken sandal and nowhere secure to sleep when a chance encounter outside the home of wealthy businessman Gabriel Mwewa changes everything.

Gabriel sees something extraordinary in Joseph: an uncanny resemblance to Jonathan, the long-lost heir to his family fortune.

There are photographs.

Old records.

Matching scars.

And the disturbing possibility that Joseph's memories of poverty, his childhood and even his own mother may not be as reliable as he believes.

Slowly, Joseph is drawn into a world that once existed behind walls he could only look over. He gains security, education, influence and wealth. More importantly, he discovers that his experience of poverty gives him something the people around Gabriel often lack: an understanding of what their business decisions actually cost ordinary people.

His new life does good.

Then Joseph discovers the truth.

Gabriel knew.

What began as an extraordinary act of generosity becomes a far more difficult question:

Can you morally justify deceiving someone if the lie genuinely makes their life better?

And if a lie produces love, opportunity and real good in the world, what happens when telling the truth threatens everything it created?

Set in Zambia, The Inheritance of Joseph Chanda is a provocative literary story about poverty and privilege, memory and identity, generosity and control — and the uncomfortable boundary between helping another human being and deciding what their life ought to be.

Some gifts can be returned.

Some inheritances cannot.