Weekly Reader: Luck by Chris Coppell; Lucky in Premise, Unlucky in Execution

Weekly Reader: Luck by Chris Coppell; Lucky in Premise, Unlucky in Execution

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

Spoilers: Luck by Chris Coppell has so many things going for it: a suspenseful horror tale about someone with the power of mental manipulation even before they are born and a savage political satire about an inexperienced presidential candidate winning people over with those same abilities. However, somewhere this idea gets lost in a narrative of inconsistencies, plot contrivances, and possibilities that would have made a better story than the one we ended up with.

Daniel Trapp is born lucky, so we are told in the first line, and he would be. I mean after all if your father and seven months pregnant mother are killed in their car by an incoming train and you are saved by an emergency Cesarean section, yeah you'd be considered lucky too. He is adopted by his mother's sister, Mary and her husband, Henry and it isn't too long before they notice something odd about Daniel. Daniel also notices that he can see auras surrounding people, usually red or blue, and if he gives those auras a slight tap, he can get people to do whatever he wants. As he grows, so do his power and ambitions.

The book starts out promising. When Mary and Henry arrive in Colorado where Daniel is born, there is a self-awareness that borders on parody. Once they visit the hotel in which they are staying in, they compare it to the Overlook in The Shining. The bartender, who bears a strong similarity to Lloyd in the film, even jokingly refers to Henry as "Mr. Torrance."  

The locals practically have to hit the couple over the head with signs that Daniel's parents were "troubled" and something weird is going on. There is a genre savviness in this book but apparently not enough when the main characters stumble right into such a scenario.

It is kind of fascinating to read as Daniel learns how to use his powers to get what he and his family wants. He is able to get teachers to give him good grades, kids to play with him, or bullies to back off. He influences future nannies to display their worst qualities until he finds one, Christy, that he sees the blue aura around.

Good luck doesn't just benefit Daniel. Henry's hologram technology takes off and he gets a great position at CERN. Mary's house flipping business is a success and Daniel gets involved while still a teenager. Daniel and his adopted parents have the world at their feet.

Everyone follows them and if they don't  or the lad feels that they "outlived their usefulness" they have a tendency to disappear or take their own lives. 

However, the plot loses something as the tone shifts from horror to political satire. The commentary about someone using their cult of personality to gain power is interesting and very obviously patterned off of certain real life figures but that's also when the book loses itself. What could be its strongest asset becomes its greatest weakness because the plot falls apart under the political commentary.

A character gets introduced who finally proves to be a match towards Daniel's abilities and could be just as powerful as he is. Unfortunately, they are removed in a very anticlimactic manner before we get any answers to their abilities.

While one character is removed in an actually moving passage, another gets sidelined until they are useful to the narrative. Daniel's story gets resolved in a manner that had no hints of foreshadowing or points leading to this denouncement. Instead, it's a twist ending just to provide a twist. It's a book that starts strong but could be so much better.

What else can I say but paraphrase the old gambler's motto: Chris Coppell's book is unlucky in plot but lucky in premise.