A Certain Kind of Luck

"It’s no mistake that many of these stories have their own unique rhythms and soundtracks. The collection itself has a symphonic quality: surprises and swellings and convergences abound, perfectly capturing painful, beautiful, and worthwhile moments in the characters’ lives."
—Robert Yune, author of Impossible Children, winner of the 2018 Mary McCarthy Prize

"Stories of family, stories of place. In A CERTAIN KIND OF LUCK, B. R. Lewis offers readers a window into a Pacific Northwest that is often overlooked. These are big hearted stories, full of grit and resolve, empathy and love, care and compromise."
—Leyna Krow, author of Sinkhole And Other Inexplicable Voids and Fire Season

"In these powerful, keenly observed stories, B.R. Lewis brings the contours of the Pacific Northwest to vivid life, from the tunnels beneath Portland to the watermelon fields of Hermiston, while training a piercing eye on characters caught up in the forces that bind and divide us."
—Shawn Vestal, author of Daredevils and Godforsaken Idaho

"The past is always close at hand in B. R. Lewis’s debut, A Certain Kind of Luck , a collection of finely-crafted stories about family, love and loss, damage and endurance. Lewis captures the rain soaked northwest beautifully, as well as its dry, desert moods, the attendant heat and gloom and renewal a perfect place to bring these well-wrought characters fully to life."
—Samuel Ligon, author of Among the Dead and Dreaming and Wonderland


B. R. Lewis was born in Portland, OR, but raised across the river in the paper-mill town of Camas, WA. He graduated from Western Washington University and earned his MFA at Eastern Washington University’s Inland Northwest Center for Writers in Spokane. Between degrees, he completed two terms of service with AmeriCorps in Sitka, AK and Vancouver, WA. He served as an editor for both Willow Springs and Sundog Lit. He currently lives in southern Oregon, where he teaches at Umpqua Community College.