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by Will Leitch ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 11, 2021

A lightweight thriller contours an earnest, sincere portrait of a hero whom many insist on seeing as a victim.

The lone witness to an abduction tries to get skeptical police—and a skeptical society—to see past his wheelchair.

Like most residents of Athens, Georgia, 26-year-old Daniel looks forward to the escape of Game Week, when the University of Georgia plays football at home. Unlike most of them, however, Daniel has spinal muscular atrophy, a progressive genetic disorder that attacks the body from the core out. He can still move his left hand, which he uses to operate his wheelchair and type on an iPad that interfaces with his voice speaker and allows him to work on social media for a commuter airline. One morning Daniel sees a familiar young woman climb into a tan Camaro. After she's reported missing, he posts what he saw on Reddit and begins an email exchange with someone claiming to be the car’s driver. The members of a well-drawn, if spare, cast play supporting roles—Marjani, Daniel’s overworked caregiver; Travis, his lifelong best friend, who's “like a stoner Ichabod Crane”; Jennifer, the grad student who is “suddenly the matriarch of this weird little family”—but the story belongs to Daniel. He’s funny, often self-deprecating, and cleareyed about how many people perceive “someone who doesn’t seem to have control of any element of his body,” but he wants people to “remember there’s a person in here.” Leitch, who is abled, drew inspiration from his young son’s friend who was diagnosed with SMA as a toddler, and the best parts of the book are the reflective, informative passages when Daniel is discussing his ever evolving relationship with his condition. The resolution of the mystery is neither surprising nor terribly realistic, but it’s not really the point here.

Pub Date: May 11, 2021

ISBN: 978-0-06-307-309-8

Page Count: 304

Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: March 5, 2021

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2021

LITERARY FICTION | GENERAL FICTION

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New York Times Bestseller

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 6, 2024

A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.

A young woman’s experience as a nurse in Vietnam casts a deep shadow over her life.

When we learn that the farewell party in the opening scene is for Frances “Frankie” McGrath’s older brother—“a golden boy, a wild child who could make the hardest heart soften”—who is leaving to serve in Vietnam in 1966, we feel pretty certain that poor Finley McGrath is marked for death. Still, it’s a surprise when the fateful doorbell rings less than 20 pages later. His death inspires his sister to enlist as an Army nurse, and this turn of events is just the beginning of a roller coaster of a plot that’s impressive and engrossing if at times a bit formulaic. Hannah renders the experiences of the young women who served in Vietnam in all-encompassing detail. The first half of the book, set in gore-drenched hospital wards, mildewed dorm rooms, and boozy officers’ clubs, is an exciting read, tracking the transformation of virginal, uptight Frankie into a crack surgical nurse and woman of the world. Her tensely platonic romance with a married surgeon ends when his broken, unbreathing body is airlifted out by helicopter; she throws her pent-up passion into a wild affair with a soldier who happens to be her dead brother’s best friend. In the second part of the book, after the war, Frankie seems to experience every possible bad break. A drawback of the story is that none of the secondary characters in her life are fully three-dimensional: Her dismissive, chauvinistic father and tight-lipped, pill-popping mother, her fellow nurses, and her various love interests are more plot devices than people. You’ll wish you could have gone to Vegas and placed a bet on the ending—while it’s against all the odds, you’ll see it coming from a mile away.

Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024

ISBN: 9781250178633

Page Count: 480

Publisher: St. Martin's

Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2023

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2023

FAMILY LIFE & FRIENDSHIP | GENERAL FICTION | HISTORICAL FICTION

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SEEN & HEARD

by Nora Roberts ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 21, 2024

A touching story of love and grief ends in an epic battle of good versus evil.

Roberts’ latest may move you to tears, or joy, or dread, or all three.

Every summer, John and Cora Fox visit Cora’s mother, Lucy Lannigan, in Redbud Hollow, Kentucky, leaving their children, 12-year-old Thea and 10-year-old Rem, for a two-week taste of heaven. The children love Grammie Lucy far more than John’s snooty family, which looks down on Cora. Lucy, a healer with deep Appalachian roots, loves animals, cooks the best meals, plays musical instruments, and makes soap and candles for her thriving business. Thea—who’s inherited the psychic abilities passed down through the women of Lucy’s family—has vivid magical dreams, one of which becomes a living nightmare when a psychopath robs and murders John and Cora as Thea watches helplessly. Thea’s description of the killer and her ability to see him in real time help the skeptical police catch Ray Riggs, who goes to prison for life. Although Thea and Rem go on to have a wonderful childhood with Grammie, Thea constantly wages a mental battle with Riggs, who tries to use his own psychic abilities to get into her mind. Over the years, Thea uses her imagination to become a game designer while the more business-minded Rem helps manage her career. Thea eventually builds a house near Lucy, where a newly arrived neighbor is her teen crush, singer-songwriter Tyler Brennan. Tyler has his own issues and is protective of his young son but slowly builds a loving relationship with Thea, whose silence about her abilities leads to a devastating misunderstanding. At first Thea tries to keep Riggs locked out of her mind. As her powers grow, she torments him. Finally, she realizes that she must win this battle and destroy him if she’s ever to have peace.

Pub Date: May 21, 2024

ISBN: 9781250289698

Page Count: 432

Review Posted Online: March 23, 2024

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2024

ROMANCE | GENERAL ROMANCE | SUSPENSE | GENERAL FICTION | THRILLER | SUSPENSE | GENERAL THRILLER & SUSPENSE

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by Nora Roberts

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How Lucky, a review by Tanya

7 Hours, 28 min Published May 11, 2021 by Harper Audio

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This was a #BookstagramMadeMeDoIt read. I saw this book getting great reviews on #Instagram and thought I’d give it a try. My library had the audio available and so I grabbed it right away. I had no idea what the book was about, which is my favorite way to start a new book!

Have you ever watched the old movie, Rear Window with James Stewart and directed by Alfred Hitchock? If you haven’t, please go rent it now, don’t wait! I saw it in High School and I was so intrigued and I think it is one of the main reasons why I started turning to mysteries. Well that and of course, Nancy Drew.

This book reminded me a lot of that movie. Daniel has a debilitating disease which leaves him wheelchair bound. He witnesses what he thinks is a kidnapping and that’s where the mystery begins. I couldn’t wait to find out what happened in the mystery part of this story. It was quite a fun ride.

The other part of the story is Daniel explaining his disease, his life to date and his hopes for his future (if you can call them hopes). It was such a unique crossing of topics in a book. I was captivated by how Daniel manages his disease and his current lifestyle.

The ending was maybe a little bit rushed but overall, very interesting. I was almost brought to tears as it was very bittersweet.

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1662 S. Lumpkin St, Athens, GA 30606 |  706.850.2843  | Hours

Read about our Summer Snooze

How Lucky: A Mystery Novel (Hardcover)

Staff Reviews

I enjoyed reading Will Leitch's debut novel, How Lucky . Picked it up because I wanted to read a novel by a local author; kept with it because I HAD to figure out how the plot lines would resolve. To my happiness, Leitch kept me guessing 'til the very end. (P.S. The Athens references were a delight!)

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2022 Edgar Award Nominee for Best Novel

“A fantastic novel. . . . You are going to like this a lot.”—Stephen King

“What’s more thrilling than a fictional character speaking to us in a voice we haven’t heard before, a voice so authentic and immediate—think Huck Finn, Holden Caulfield, Mattie Ross—that we suspect it must’ve been there all along, that we somehow managed to miss it? Daniel, the protagonist of Will Leitch’s smart, funny, heartbreaking new novel  How Lucky , is just such a voice, and I’m not sure it will ever completely leave my head, or that I want it to.”—Richard Russo

For readers of The   Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time and Nothing to See Here , a first novel as suspenseful and funny as it is moving, the unforgettable story of a fiercely resilient young man living with a physical disability, and his efforts to solve a mystery unfolding right outside his door. 

Daniel leads a rich life in the university town of Athens, Georgia. He’s got a couple close friends, a steady paycheck working for a regional airline, and of course, for a few glorious days each Fall, college football tailgates. He considers himself to be a mostly lucky guy—despite the fact that he’s suffered from a debilitating disease since he was a small child, one that has left him unable to speak or to move without a wheelchair. 

Largely confined to his home, Daniel spends the hours he’s not online communicating with irate air travelers observing his neighborhood from his front porch. One young woman passes by so frequently that spotting her out the window has almost become part of his daily routine. Until the day he’s almost sure he sees her being kidnapped...

Will Leitch is the author of the novel How Lucky and a contributing editor at New York magazine and the founder of the late sports website Deadspin. He writes regularly for the New York Times , the Washington Post , The Atlantic, NBC News, CNN, and MLB.com. He lives in Athens, Georgia, with his wife and two sons.

• Fiction / Mystery & Detective / Amateur Sleuth
• Fiction / Thrillers / Domestic
• Fiction / Southern
• Paperback (May 10th, 2022): $16.99
• MP3 CD (May 11th, 2021): $39.99
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"I'm reading a fantastic novel by Will Leitch called How Lucky . Publishes in May, I think. It's suspenseful and often wildly funny. You are going to like this a lot, and I think a lot of you are going to like it. It has that Where the Crawdads Sing vibe." — Stephen King

“An absorbing thriller with heart.”  — People

“What’s more thrilling than a fictional character speaking to us in a voice we haven’t heard before, a voice so authentic and immediate - think Huck Finn, Holden Caulfield, Mattie Ross - that we suspect it must’ve been there all along, that we somehow managed to miss it?  Daniel, the protagonist of Will Leitch’s smart, funny, heartbreaking new novel How Lucky , is just such a voice, and I’m not sure it will ever completely leave my head, or that I want it to.”   — Richard Russo

“Not many writers can shift gears from hilarious to heart-rending to harrowing, all on the same page. Will Leitch does it again and again. How Lucky is one of the most original thrillers I've read in years, with an improbable hero that no reader will ever forget.”  — Carl Hiaasen

“It's a testament to Will Leitch's ability that he can blend seemingly disparate elements – mystery and illness and humor and football –and come away with something so winning.  How Lucky asserts that "the world is a terrifying place these days" and the novel explores those terrors quite convincingly, yet I was heartened by the depth of Leitch's writing, his obvious love for the world and what it could be. He imbues his hero with a kind of hopefulness that comes from seeing the worst and finding some way to keep living.” — Kevin Wilson,  New York Times  bestselling author of  Nothing to See Here

“ How Lucky is a gem: a riveting plot and a narrator who is charming, engaging, and downright inspiring. Will Leitch brilliantly juggles hilarity and horror. I loved this novel — every page.” — Chris Bohjalian, #1 Bestselling Author of The Flight Attendant and Hour of the Witch

“A lovely book. Set in Athens, Georgia, the novel is a model of verisimilitude.  It is also beautifully written and suspenseful, at the same time being all about goodness and caring without once being sappy, or, well, sentimental.  And that is a rare feat in fiction.”  — Booklist (starred review)

“A touchingly imagined portrait of friendship and community.”  — Sam Sacks, The Wall Street Journal

“Witty, vigorously written. . . . How Lucky succeeds on more than just luck . . . Leitch builds his cast beautifully. . . . Gives us an authentic, compelling portrait of a narrator who motors through the obstacle course of his life with grit and grace” . — Hamilton Cain, Washington Post

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View Audiobook

Being the sole witness to a crime proves complicated in this funny, heartwarming story of a hero hiding in plain sight.

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Suburban drama

Daniel leads a rich life in the university town of Athens, Georgia. He’s got a couple close friends, a steady paycheck working for a regional airline, and of course, for a few glorious days each Fall, college football tailgates. He considers himself to be a mostly lucky guy—despite the fact that he’s suffered from a debilitating disease since he was a small child, one that has left him unable to speak or to move without a wheelchair.

Largely confined to his home, Daniel spends the hours he’s not online communicating with irate air travelers observing his neighborhood from his front porch. One young woman passes by so frequently that spotting her out the window has almost become part of his daily routine. Until the day he’s almost sure he sees her being kidnapped.

How Lucky is the unforgettable story of a fiercely resilient young man grappling with a physical disability, and his efforts to solve a mystery unfolding right outside his door.

Free sample

My life is not a thriller. My life is the opposite of a thriller.

What a relief. Who wants their life to be thrilling? Don’t get me wrong. We want our lives to be exciting: we want them to inspire, to be surprising, to provide us a reason to get up and experience something new every day. But thrilling? No way, man. Everything that happens in a thriller would be completely fucking terrifying in real life. You’ve seen a million chase scenes in movies, so many that you barely even look up from folding laundry when one happens in whatever you are watching on Netflix at that particular moment. They are dull; they are rote and boring. But if you were in one of those chase scenes, it would be a nightmare. You’d be running . . . for your life! If you survived it, you would spend years trying to get over it. You’d shake and cower about it in therapy, you’d have nightmares reliving it from which you woke up screaming, you’d have trouble developing any sort of human connection with another person. It would be the worst thing that ever happened to you.

Real life, mercifully, isn’t a thriller. Those things don’t happen to you, and they don’t happen to me. My life is nothing but small moments, and so is yours. We don’t live in a series of plot points. We should be thankful for that. We should realize how lucky we are.

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Why I love it

Kevin Wilson

Author, nothing to see here.

I love novels where the voice immediately disarms me, as if we already know each other—characters who at first aren’t even sure what’s so special about their story, but from those first lines, you know that you need to hear it. In How Lucky , Daniel has that same magic. It’s in the way he tells you, “My life is not a thriller,” and then, in a voice tinged with both pain and hopefulness, he lays out something that sure sounds like a thriller, but maybe not in the way we’ve heard it before.

Daniel considers himself to have a pretty great life: good friends, a steady job, a love of college football. He also has spinal muscular atrophy, which means he must use a wheelchair, cannot move his extremities, and speaks mostly through a voice generator box. He’s incredibly observant of the world around him, and this crystallizes in the moment he sees a young woman get into a car and disappear—making him the sole eye-witness to a potential crime he might just be the only person who can solve.

To echo Daniel, this book is not a thriller. But it is a propulsive story about one unforgettable protagonist I would have followed through any plot line. In a story that knows how bad this world can be, How Lucky offers a hard-earned hopefulness. It refuses to be easy, to give in, as if Leitch and his narrator are doing all that they can to tell us that there are reasons to live in this world, to hold on, to search for something meaningful.

Member ratings (18,418)

Burleson , TX

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Great read. Extremely insightful regarding those with disabilities and what it takes to get through daily life. The mystery element was perfectly woven throughout and I couldn’t put it down

Somerville , MA

I don’t often read book by men (they have enough readers ????) but I’m glad I gave this a shot. You could tell the author cared deeply about this character’s humanity while telling a fun/thrilling tale.

Terre Haute , IN

I absolutely loved HOW LUCKY by Will Leitch. It really surprised me for I don’t believe I’ve ever read a more down-to-earth written book and believe me, I read a lot of books. Read it, you’ll love it!

East Lyme , CT

What an extraordinary book! I honestly wasn’t expecting much when I started reading but I soon realized this was something special. “Letting someone help you is the nicest thing you can do for anyone”

Brandenburg , KY

I loved this book. I wasn’t expecting Daniel to be in a wheelchair. I thought he could walk. I didn’t even realize he couldn’t talk either. The ending made me teary eyed. I 10/10 recommend this book.

• Mystery, Thriller & Suspense
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How Lucky: A Mystery Novel Paperback – May 10 2022

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2022 Edgar Award Nominee for Best Novel

“A fantastic novel. . . . You are going to like this a lot.”—Stephen King

“What’s more thrilling than a fictional character speaking to us in a voice we haven’t heard before, a voice so authentic and immediate—think Huck Finn, Holden Caulfield, Mattie Ross—that we suspect it must’ve been there all along, that we somehow managed to miss it? Daniel, the protagonist of Will Leitch’s smart, funny, heartbreaking new novel  How Lucky , is just such a voice, and I’m not sure it will ever completely leave my head, or that I want it to.”—Richard Russo

For readers of The   Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time and Nothing to See Here , a first novel as suspenseful and funny as it is moving, the unforgettable story of a fiercely resilient young man living with a physical disability, and his efforts to solve a mystery unfolding right outside his door. 

Daniel leads a rich life in the university town of Athens, Georgia. He’s got a couple close friends, a steady paycheck working for a regional airline, and of course, for a few glorious days each Fall, college football tailgates. He considers himself to be a mostly lucky guy—despite the fact that he’s suffered from a debilitating disease since he was a small child, one that has left him unable to speak or to move without a wheelchair. 

Largely confined to his home, Daniel spends the hours he’s not online communicating with irate air travelers observing his neighborhood from his front porch. One young woman passes by so frequently that spotting her out the window has almost become part of his daily routine. Until the day he’s almost sure he sees her being kidnapped...

• Print length 304 pages
• Language English
• Publisher Harper Perennial
• Publication date May 10 2022
• Dimensions 20.2 x 2.1 x 13.7 cm
• ISBN-10 0063073056
• ISBN-13 978-0063073050
• See all details

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"I'm reading a fantastic novel by Will Leitch called How Lucky . Publishes in May, I think. It's suspenseful and often wildly funny. You are going to like this a lot, and I think a lot of you are going to like it. It has that Where the Crawdads Sing vibe." — Stephen King

“An absorbing thriller with heart.”  — People

“What’s more thrilling than a fictional character speaking to us in a voice we haven’t heard before, a voice so authentic and immediate - think Huck Finn, Holden Caulfield, Mattie Ross - that we suspect it must’ve been there all along, that we somehow managed to miss it?  Daniel, the protagonist of Will Leitch’s smart, funny, heartbreaking new novel How Lucky , is just such a voice, and I’m not sure it will ever completely leave my head, or that I want it to.”   — Richard Russo

“Not many writers can shift gears from hilarious to heart-rending to harrowing, all on the same page. Will Leitch does it again and again. How Lucky is one of the most original thrillers I've read in years, with an improbable hero that no reader will ever forget.”  — Carl Hiaasen

“It's a testament to Will Leitch's ability that he can blend seemingly disparate elements – mystery and illness and humor and football –and come away with something so winning.  How Lucky asserts that "the world is a terrifying place these days" and the novel explores those terrors quite convincingly, yet I was heartened by the depth of Leitch's writing, his obvious love for the world and what it could be. He imbues his hero with a kind of hopefulness that comes from seeing the worst and finding some way to keep living.” — Kevin Wilson,  New York Times  bestselling author of  Nothing to See Here

“ How Lucky is a gem: a riveting plot and a narrator who is charming, engaging, and downright inspiring. Will Leitch brilliantly juggles hilarity and horror. I loved this novel — every page.” — Chris Bohjalian, #1 Bestselling Author of The Flight Attendant and Hour of the Witch

“A lovely book. Set in Athens, Georgia, the novel is a model of verisimilitude.  It is also beautifully written and suspenseful, at the same time being all about goodness and caring without once being sappy, or, well, sentimental.  And that is a rare feat in fiction.”  — Booklist (starred review)

“A touchingly imagined portrait of friendship and community.”  — Sam Sacks, The Wall Street Journal

“Witty, vigorously written. . . . How Lucky succeeds on more than just luck . . . Leitch builds his cast beautifully. . . . Gives us an authentic, compelling portrait of a narrator who motors through the obstacle course of his life with grit and grace” . — Hamilton Cain, Washington Post

About the Author

Will Leitch is a contributing editor at  New York  magazine and the founder of the late sports website Deadspin .  He writes regularly for the  New York Times , the  Washington Post ,   NBC News, Medium , and MLB.com. He lives in Athens, Georgia, with his wife and two sons.

Product details

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Harper Perennial (May 10 2022)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Paperback ‏ : ‎ 304 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0063073056
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0063073050
• Item weight ‏ : ‎ 226 g
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 20.2 x 2.1 x 13.7 cm
• #5,508 in Private Investigator Mysteries (Books)
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About the author

Will leitch.

Will Leitch lives in Athens, Georgia with his family and is the author of five books, including the upcoming novel How Lucky, released by Harper in May 2021. He writes regularly for New York, MLB.com, Medium, The New York Times and the Washington Post. He is the founder of the late website Deadspin. He also writes a free weekly newsletter that you might enjoy at williamfleitch.substack.com.

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How Lucky: A Novel by Will Leitch

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The unlikely hero is a funny and quirky young physically disabled man with a degenerative illness that will not give up spite of it. His friendship with his childhood friend is endearing.

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2022 Edgar Award Nominee for Best Novel

“A fantastic novel. . . . You are going to like this a lot.”—Stephen King

“What’s more thrilling than a fictional character speaking to us in a voice we haven’t heard before, a voice so authentic and immediate—think Huck Finn, Holden Caulfield, Mattie Ross—that we suspect it must’ve been there all along, that we somehow managed to miss it? Daniel, the protagonist of Will Leitch’s smart, funny, heartbreaking new novel  How Lucky , is just such a voice, and I’m not sure it will ever completely leave my head, or that I want it to.”—Richard Russo

For readers of The   Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time and Nothing to See Here , a first novel as suspenseful and funny as it is moving, the unforgettable story of a fiercely resilient young man living with a physical disability, and his efforts to solve a mystery unfolding right outside his door. 

Daniel leads a rich life in the university town of Athens, Georgia. He’s got a couple close friends, a steady paycheck working for a regional airline, and of course, for a few glorious days each Fall, college football tailgates. He considers himself to be a mostly lucky guy—despite the fact that he’s suffered from a debilitating disease since he was a small child, one that has left him unable to speak or to move without a wheelchair. 

Largely confined to his home, Daniel spends the hours he’s not online communicating with irate air travelers observing his neighborhood from his front porch. One young woman passes by so frequently that spotting her out the window has almost become part of his daily routine. Until the day he’s almost sure he sees her being kidnapped...

• Print length 304 pages
• Language English
• Publisher Harper Perennial
• Publication date 10 May 2022
• Dimensions 20.2 x 2.1 x 13.7 cm
• ISBN-10 0063073056
• ISBN-13 978-0063073050
• See all details

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"I'm reading a fantastic novel by Will Leitch called How Lucky . Publishes in May, I think. It's suspenseful and often wildly funny. You are going to like this a lot, and I think a lot of you are going to like it. It has that Where the Crawdads Sing vibe." — Stephen King

“An absorbing thriller with heart.”  — People

“What’s more thrilling than a fictional character speaking to us in a voice we haven’t heard before, a voice so authentic and immediate - think Huck Finn, Holden Caulfield, Mattie Ross - that we suspect it must’ve been there all along, that we somehow managed to miss it?  Daniel, the protagonist of Will Leitch’s smart, funny, heartbreaking new novel How Lucky , is just such a voice, and I’m not sure it will ever completely leave my head, or that I want it to.”   — Richard Russo

“Not many writers can shift gears from hilarious to heart-rending to harrowing, all on the same page. Will Leitch does it again and again. How Lucky is one of the most original thrillers I've read in years, with an improbable hero that no reader will ever forget.”  — Carl Hiaasen

“It's a testament to Will Leitch's ability that he can blend seemingly disparate elements – mystery and illness and humor and football –and come away with something so winning.  How Lucky asserts that "the world is a terrifying place these days" and the novel explores those terrors quite convincingly, yet I was heartened by the depth of Leitch's writing, his obvious love for the world and what it could be. He imbues his hero with a kind of hopefulness that comes from seeing the worst and finding some way to keep living.” — Kevin Wilson,  New York Times  bestselling author of  Nothing to See Here

“ How Lucky is a gem: a riveting plot and a narrator who is charming, engaging, and downright inspiring. Will Leitch brilliantly juggles hilarity and horror. I loved this novel — every page.” — Chris Bohjalian, #1 Bestselling Author of The Flight Attendant and Hour of the Witch

“A lovely book. Set in Athens, Georgia, the novel is a model of verisimilitude.  It is also beautifully written and suspenseful, at the same time being all about goodness and caring without once being sappy, or, well, sentimental.  And that is a rare feat in fiction.”  — Booklist (starred review)

“A touchingly imagined portrait of friendship and community.”  — Sam Sacks, The Wall Street Journal

“Witty, vigorously written. . . . How Lucky succeeds on more than just luck . . . Leitch builds his cast beautifully. . . . Gives us an authentic, compelling portrait of a narrator who motors through the obstacle course of his life with grit and grace” . — Hamilton Cain, Washington Post

About the Author

Will Leitch is a contributing editor at  New York  magazine and the founder of the late sports website Deadspin .  He writes regularly for the  New York Times , the  Washington Post ,   NBC News, Medium , and MLB.com. He lives in Athens, Georgia, with his wife and two sons.

Product details

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Harper Perennial (10 May 2022)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Paperback ‏ : ‎ 304 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0063073056
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0063073050
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 226 g
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 20.2 x 2.1 x 13.7 cm
• #20,706 in Thrillers and Suspense
• #22,060 in Mysteries (Books)
• #29,521 in Crime Fiction (Books)

About the author

Will leitch.

Will Leitch lives in Athens, Georgia with his family and is the author of five books, including the upcoming novel How Lucky, released by Harper in May 2021. He writes regularly for New York, MLB.com, Medium, The New York Times and the Washington Post. He is the founder of the late website Deadspin. He also writes a free weekly newsletter that you might enjoy at williamfleitch.substack.com.

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Welcome to the Book Review Book Club. Every month, we select a book to discuss on our podcast and with our readers. Please leave your thoughts on this month’s book in this article’s comments. And be sure to check out some of our past conversations, including ones about “James,” by Percival Everett , and “Demon Copperhead,” by Barbara Kingsolver.

“Andi Taylor is pumping her hands together, hitting her own flat stomach, thinking not of her mother sitting at home with her little brother, not of her car, which barely got her here, not of her summer job, her lifeguarding at the overcrowded community pool, not of the 4-year-old she watched die, the 4-year-old she practically killed, and his blue cheeks. … She’s thinking about the things she always does wrong when she fights. … She is also thinking about the way Artemis Victor will get her.”

So begins Rita Bullwinkel’s novel, “Headshot,” about the fierce and competitive world of youth women’s boxing.

The story follows eight teenagers fighting in the Daughters of America Cup, a tournament staged in a dilapidated gym in Reno. The novel is structured around the tournament’s bracket, each chapter detailing a match between fighters, bout after bout, until finally a champion is declared.

The drama of the novel is twofold. We are thrown into the high-octane theater of each fight, as the boxers work to land punches and defeat their opponents. (“Rachel Doricko plans to destroy Kate Heffer in well-formed increments.”) But we also explore each girl’s life — the novel flashes into the past to see the baggage that each carries; into the future to see what will happen to each once her boxing career is over; and into the girls’ minds in the present, as they reckon with their intense desires to make something of themselves. (“Here, at the Daughters of America tournament, Tanya Maw is a fighter. But she is also just a child — just a girl waiting to see what her life will be like compared to the lives of the other people she knows.”)

Which is to say: “Headshot” is a novel about boxing, yes, but it’s also a novel about the existential maelstrom of teenage girlhood.

For June’s Book Review Podcast book club, we’re chatting about “Headshot,” by Rita Bullwinkel . The discussion will air on June 28 , and we’d love for you to join the conversation. Share your thoughts about the novel in the comments section of this article by June 21, and we may mention your observations in the episode.

Here’s some related reading to get the conversation started:

Our critic Dwight Garner’s review of the novel: “ The impact of this novel, though, lasts a long time, like a sharp fist to your shoulder. It is so enveloping to read that you feel, at times, that you are writing it in your own mind. It contains no bogus psychologizing. Its wide-awake characters put me in mind of the singer Ian Dury’s immortal comment: ‘I’m not here to be remembered, I’m here to be alive.’” [ Read the full review here. ]

Bullwinkel’s interview with Olivia Parkes in Electric Literature: “In order to come to a match, in order to come to compete in something, you have to build the narrative in your mind that it’s the most important thing you’ll ever do. I’m interested in that dichotomy, of being forced to build a world for yourself that is so disparate from the world that society sees around you.” [ Read the full interview here .]

Kristen Roupenian’s review, for The New York Times Book Review, of Bullwinkel’s previous story collection, “Belly Up”: “In Bullwinkel’s creepy, deadpan debut, bodies become objects, objects become bodies, and bodies and objects fuse and part in fascinating, unsettling ways. For readers with the stomach for it, the book is full of squirmy pleasures.” [ Read the full review here. ]

We can’t wait to discuss the book with you. In the meantime, happy June and happy reading!

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Each week, top authors and critics join the Book Review’s podcast to talk about the latest news in the literary world. Listen here .

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How Lucky: A Novel Audio CD – CD, May 11, 2021

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Beloved journalist and sportswriter Will Leitch makes his fiction debut with this novel, as suspenseful as it is moving, the story of a young man suffering from a debilitating disease who believes he has witnessed the kidnapping of a young college student. Daniel leads a rich life in the university town of Athens, Georgia.  He’s got a couple close friends, a steady paycheck working for a regional airline, and of course, for a few glorious days each Fall, college football tailgates. He considers himself to be a mostly lucky guy—despite the fact that he’s suffered from a horrible illness since he was a small child, one that has left him unable to speak or to move without a wheelchair. 

Largely confined to his home, Daniel spends the hours he’s not online communicating with irate air travelers observing his neighborhood from his front porch. One young woman passes by so frequently that spotting her out the window has almost become part of his daily routine. Until the day he’s almost sure he sees her being kidnapped. 

How Lucky is the unforgettable story of a fiercely resilient young man grappling with a physical disability, and his efforts to solve a mystery unfolding right outside his door. 

• Print length 1 pages
• Language English
• Publisher HarperCollins B and Blackstone Publishing
• Publication date May 11, 2021
• Dimensions 5.8 x 0.5 x 5.6 inches
• ISBN-10 1665076917
• ISBN-13 978-1665076913
• See all details

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What's it about, amazon editors say....

How Lucky is a funny, poignant, yet nail-bitingly suspenseful take on the movie classic Rear Window.

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" How Lucky is a gem: a riveting plot and a narrator who is charming, engaging, and downright inspiring. Will Leitch brilliantly juggles hilarity and horror. I loved this novel -- every page."

Product details

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ HarperCollins B and Blackstone Publishing; Unabridged edition (May 11, 2021)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Audio CD ‏ : ‎ 1 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1665076917
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1665076913
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 6.4 ounces
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.8 x 0.5 x 5.6 inches
• #3,432 in Southern Fiction
• #33,779 in Coming of Age Fiction (Books)
• #40,001 in Books on CD

About the author

Will leitch.

Will Leitch lives in Athens, Georgia with his family and is the author of five books, including the upcoming novel How Lucky, released by Harper in May 2021. He writes regularly for New York, MLB.com, Medium, The New York Times and the Washington Post. He is the founder of the late website Deadspin. He also writes a free weekly newsletter that you might enjoy at williamfleitch.substack.com.

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She was 17. He was 47. Now she’s rethinking their long marriage.

Jill Ciment’s new memoir, “Consent,” is an unflinching reappraisal of a life-defining relationship.

In a paper first published in the Yale Law Journal and later reprinted in the essay collection “The Right to Sex” (2021), the Oxford philosopher Amia Srinivasan suggests that teachers who seduce their students are guilty not only of a moral transgression but of a specifically pedagogical sin. They exploit their authority too brazenly to retain any hope of equalizing the disparity in knowledge between instructor and pupil, and the result is “a failure to satisfy the duties that arise from the practice of teaching.” I have often suspected that the inverse is also true — that a teacher who sleeps with a student is making both a pedagogical and romantic error. Asymmetry is intrinsic to the teacher-student relationship, but the most satisfactory love arises between equals. How could a single person occupy such sharply conflicting roles?

In her probing new memoir, “ Consent ,” the novelist Jill Ciment is right to wonder whether the painter Arnold Mesches, who died in 2016 at 93 , was her husband or her teacher. When they met, she was a 16-year-old naif enrolled in his art class, and he was an established painter with a mortgage, a wife and two children. “What do I call him?” Ciment asks on the first page of “Consent.” “My husband? Arnold? I would if the story were about how we met and married, shared meals for forty-five years, raised a puppy, endured illness. But if the story is about an older man preying on a teenager, shouldn’t I call him ‘the artist’ or, better still, ‘the art teacher?’”

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For the most part, she opts for the neutral “Arnold,” not the sinister “art teacher” or the implausibly innocuous “my husband,” perhaps in recognition of a potent paradox: Arnold taught Ciment, but he also managed to adore her. Despite her feminist convictions, despite her agonized awareness of the lechery of his initial overtures, despite her disgust at the cliché of an older man chasing after a youthful ingenue, she cannot deny that Arnold played two contradictory parts successfully.

Ciment has written about her knotty romance with Arnold before, both in her fiction and in her colorful romp of a memoir “Half a Life,” published in 1996. That earlier book is mostly a portrait of her fraying family — her turbulent and explosive father, her long-suffering mother, the humiliations of their poverty — and her wayward youth in Los Angeles, and Arnold makes his brief appearance only near the end. “I always assumed that art, real art, was the exclusive work of the museumed dead,” Ciment wrote, but one day she glimpsed a striking painting in a gallery window and was shocked to learn that its creator was among the living — although he was, in her eyes, an antique. (He was all of 45.) Naturally, she tripped over herself to take his painting class, where she fell hopelessly in love with him. The rest is history.

The first three-quarters of “Half a Life” are vividly novelistic, but its ending fades into an imprecise fairy tale, with hazy suggestions of happily ever after. Ciment schemes her way into a prestigious art school by getting a studious friend to take the SAT for her, then coaxes Arnold to leave his wife so they can run off together. The details — and the inevitable frictions — are elided. An untroubled and vaguely sketched cohabitation ensues.

“Consent” documents the second half of the life, but it is not quite a sequel. Instead, it is a renegotiation, even a rebuke. In “Half a Life,” Ciment recalls, she characterized a letter that Arnold wrote to her when she was 17 as “a missive between star-crossed lovers”; now she acknowledges that the note was “creepy, sinister.” In the initial seduction scene, Ciment dissolved into Arnold’s arms; now she admits that she shuddered with revulsion at his “newly exposed middle-aged neck.”

“Half a Life” elegantly evaded the question of its own veracity; “Consent” is at pains to remind us that memoirs can easily lapse into mythology. Ciment explains that she now uses the word “scene” rather than “memory” for the vignettes that appear in “Half a Life,” because “scenes in a memoir are no more accurate than reenactments on Forensic Files .” Later, she muses: “A memoir is closer to historical fiction than it is to biography. And as with historical fiction, the reader often learns more about the period in which the book was written than the period that is being written about.” What, then, do we learn about the period during which “Consent” was written — that is, now?

Ours is evidently an age of reappraisals, but this latest reappraisal itself invites reappraisal, for it is eager to undermine its own authority. In “Half a Life,” Ciment kisses Arnold first; in “Consent,” Arnold is the instigator of the affair. Ciment assures us that the latter account is more accurate, but why should we trust her any more this time around? After all, she is the one who adamantly insists that every memoir is, at heart, an invention.

Whoever kissed whomever first, the kiss occurred, and it was a prelude to a marriage that lasted 45 years. Soon after Arnold left his “age-appropriate” wife, Ciment found herself unable to sustain her impractical romantic fantasies. In place of her former adulation came love “without the nagging dreaminess.” She met Arnold’s developmentally challenged daughter, sympathized when Arnold did not receive a much-needed grant and, eventually, nursed him through cataract surgery. The Pygmalion narrative, in which a male artist fashions the ideal woman and is shocked to find she has come to life, is flipped on its head. “I had sculpted my own version of the ideal man,” Ciment writes, “and he was turning into a human being in front of me.”

She, too, was becoming a human being, in large part thanks to Arnold, who could see her as an agent before she understood herself in such liberated terms. The steely painting that graces the cover of the book is a portrait he painted of Ciment when she was 18, a work that afforded her an early glimpse of a stronger self. “I had never seen myself from his point of view,” she realized when she first saw the portrait. “The girl in the painting wasn’t a nymph or a victim or a survivor or a sugar baby or a gold digger or a bimbo or a fatherless girl desperately in need of an older man’s affection.” Ciment freely admits to having been some of these things, but Arnold demonstrated that she was also something more: “He showed me who I might become.” And showing us what we might become is a project common to both teachers and lovers.

Early in “Consent,” Ciment asks whether her marriage was all “fruit from the poisonous tree.” It is a daring question, and she is unsentimental and unflinching enough to answer it convincingly, which is to say, complexly. She shrinks from nothing in her accounting: not from Arnold’s sordid advances, not from her teenage naiveté, not from the many indignities of her situation. Nor does she shrink from the most scandalous surprise of all: the possibility of a love forceful enough to overturn the habitual hierarchies.

Of course, Ciment’s marriage was informed to some extent by its dubious origins. Arnold “had not only taught me how to draw,” she writes, “he had taught me how to see. I would forever perceive the physical world through the veneer of his interpretation.” But then, love is often a matter of learning to look through an alien lens, and there can be little doubt that Ciment altered Arnold’s vision in exchange. By the end, she writes, “we critiqued each other’s work — brutally, lavishly, meticulously — not as teacher and pupil, but as collaborators.” In the mornings, she read him her writing, and he showed her his paintings. “He was my first audience, as I was his first viewer.”

Ciment’s thesis at art school reimagined pornographic scenes from the female perspective, and “Consent” makes an analogous intervention, rewriting the classic seduction plot from the younger woman’s point of view. Ciment wonders what would have happened to Lolita if she had cared for Humbert as he aged. Perhaps both characters would have escaped their mutual idealization and grown into true equals.

In all likelihood, this is a consoling fiction, but as Ciment stresses, memoirs are fictions, too. And aren’t relationships the most powerful fictions of all? Like Arnold’s portrait, they show us possibilities that we could never have dreamed up alone, and like all works of art, they admit of emendation. Revision — even redemption — is possible. We are never consigned to the first or the ugliest draft.

Becca Rothfeld is the nonfiction book critic for The Washington Post and the author of “All Things Are Too Small: Essays in Praise of Excess.”

By Jill Ciment

Pantheon. 145 pp. $27

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