Can Siblings Have Different Ancestries?

Trace Evidence releases August 22, 2017. The date is coming up quickly!

You’ll remember from Blood Trails (the first in the Heir Hunter thriller series) that Michael Flint is a genealogist… sort of. As an heir hunter, he’s much more than a genealogist, often taking his life and the lives of others into his own hands as the heir hunter of last resort.

In my research for these books, one question that came up was whether siblings have the same ethnicity.

We know identical twins have the same DNA.

But with siblings, it can be more complicated. According to The Tech Museum of Innovation

“Because of how DNA is passed on, it is possible for two siblings to have some big differences in their ancestry at the DNA level. Culturally they may each say they are ‘1/8th Cherokee’ but at the DNA level, one may have no Cherokee DNA at all.”

The article does a good job of explaining it, but basically, the reason for different ancestries between siblings boils down to this:

  • A child gets 50% of their DNA from their father and 50% from their mother. But it’s not always the same 50%.

 

Genetics Diagram

That’s why parents can end up with two children who look quite different from each other. Here are two examples in one picture:

The mother on the left has two boys with the same father. The mother on the right has two girls with the same father. Some people don’t believe the boys are brothers or that the girls are sisters.

We will continue to explore topics related to ancestry, DNA, and heir hunting as we celebrate the upcoming release of Trace Evidence.

You can pre-order the book HERE.

Trace Evidence by Diane Capri

 

The son of billionaire tech CEO Veronica Beaumont is in desperate need of a bone marrow transplant. A potential match could come from the boy’s father. One problem — his father is presumed dead.

So Veronica hires Michael Flint, the heir hunter of last resort, to do the impossible: find the boy’s father. Could he actually be alive? Judging by the efforts of two men going to great lengths to ensure the man will never surface, Flint has reason to believe the boy’s father is, in fact, alive.

But in his search, Flint uncovers clues to a cold case he’d tried desperately to close years ago.

Will the new clues block Flint from finding the boy’s father before it’s too late?

Trace Evidence releases August 22, 2017.

Meanwhile —

Caffeinate and Carry On!

Diane Capri

p.s. Are you a member of the Diane Capri’s Exclusive Reading Group mailing list? It’s FREE! Just CLICK HERE to sign up and refer your friends, too. You’ll be glad you did, I promise. Can’t wait to see you there!

 

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