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Top reviews from the United States

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Padgett Gerler, author of INVISIBLE GIRL

STUNNINGLY CRAFTED, ORIGINAL, CREATIVE

Reviewed in the United States on January 18, 2021

Verified Purchase

I love an original, creative turn of phrase. Kathryn Schwille is about as creative and original as any author I’ve read. And, wow, can she ever turn a phrase!

The stunningly-crafted WHAT LUCK, THIS LIFE is set in fictional Kiser, Texas against the backdrop of the 2003 Columbia Space Shuttle disaster. Told in brief vignettes, WHAT LUCK, THIS LIFE is not so much a story as it is a character study of raw honesty of the desperate, yet somehow hopeful, residents of the small town.

Accustomed to tales that tie up characters’ lives with neat little bows by story’s end, I was delighted to find each vignette ending in delicious ambiguity, making me want more…more…

billie hinton

Beautiful, engaging read.

Reviewed in the United States on April 3, 2019

Verified Purchase

This novel soars, using the frame of a fallen space shuttle to reveal the stories of the people who find the pieces in their county, town, back yards. It’s woven together seamlessly so that by the end you see the big picture, a zooming out that feels like the whoosh of a shooting star.

C. Etter

Great characters, storyline weaves them into a tapestry set in a forgotten piece of recent history

Reviewed in the United States on November 22, 2018

Verified Purchase

Outstanding first novel! The characters and setting keeps you reading from page one

BD Pruitt

Impressive debut

Reviewed in the United States on March 13, 2019

Verified Purchase

A thought provoking look at the impact of the space shuttle disaster on the lives of small town Texans. Well done.

Pam

Moving and memorable

Reviewed in the United States on October 5, 2018

This novel sucked me in on the first page, as the author describes the moment the space shuttle Columbia cracked apart over east Texas in 2003:
"Coyotes, weasels, green flies, crows. The animals heard it first. Along the weedy edge of Route 20, a turkey buzzard quit the possum she'd lucked into and took cover in a stand of pines. The wild pig under Cecil Dawson's oak trees snorted twice and froze. To us, it came from out of nowhere: two blasts and the roar of a crashing train that rumbled far too long."
Kathryn Schwille, trained as a journalist, has the eye of a reporter and artistry of a poet. I attended a book event where she described the research she did in east Texas. Her description of the disaster – shuttle and human body parts raining down on a small town – is accurate. But then she imagines the town of Kiser, Texas, and introduces us to citizens dealing with life – a failing marriage, failing business, alcoholism – suddenly thrust into the spotlight when a national tragedy lands, literally, on their doorstep. It's a vivid, moving story. I loved it.

Tim Treanor

What luck for us!

Reviewed in the United States on September 24, 2018

The Columbia Space Shuttle disintegrated at more than twenty times the speed of sound on February 1, 2003 high above Texas, killing all aboard. In this brilliant, beautiful novel the debris and body parts land in the fictional town of Kiser, Texas, where lives there, too, are disintegrating at more than the speed of sound. Kathryn Schwille has shrewdly crafted a collection of interlocking short narratives, in which the characters are all examined from their own perspectives and the perspectives of others, like an object in space studied over time.

Like any good literary novel, What Luck, This Life is bathed in graceful and lively prose -- images so sharp and provocative that the reader is occasionally obliged to stop and recognize that he has discovered a new way of looking at things. What distinguishes Schwille's novel is the enormous empathy with which she treats her characters. And there are some rotters here, too -- especially a skeezy predator and a sanctimonious minister. Schwille does not paper their faults over, but when she writes inside their characters, we can see them as they see themselves. There is not an ounce of condescension in any of her writing.

There are some novels that make you feel better after you read them. What Luck, This Life does that one better. After reading it, you may actually *be* a better person.

Litwriter

Powerful portraits, post-disaster

Reviewed in the United States on February 9, 2019

I envy anyone reading this book for the first time. The premise is compelling: how does the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster affect the inhabitants of the down-on-its-luck town where much of the debris landed? Rather than dwell on the disaster itself, Schwille directs her razor-sharp attention to seemingly ordinary characters—residents in a senior living facility, the proprietress of a gas station/convenience store—whose lives are steeped in false hope, family tensions, betrayal, desire and self-aggrandizement. Yes, there are remnants of the shuttle and its crew to be recovered, and this process is documented with precision and sensitivity. However, what commands the reader’s attention—and compassion—are the everyday struggles of people whose fortunes seem steadily headed south. Each chapter delivers a searing yet poetic snapshot of a life that will not be recorded in NASA history, but indelibly in the reader’s imagination. And the final chapter, oh my! Nothing short of a literary tour de force.

Judy Goldman

I'm your new best friend because I'm telling you about a book you will love!

Reviewed in the United States on November 10, 2018

I really loved this book. And everybody I know who's read this book also really loved it. What Luck, This Life is smart, heartbreaking, original, beautifully written, surprising, and totally captivating. Can you tell how highly I recommend it? A winner!