LUCKY'S BLUES — Thomas Bontly

Last Chance/First Chance. Lucky Lantz may be at the end of his rope, but he's swinging that rope as hard as he can. Returning to his hometown after a long recovery in a sanitarium for TB, he has one last chance to step away from death's door and squeeze in some more living-quiet, restrained living with no booze, gambling, or jam sessions. A lifetime of playing jazz music in smoky honky-tonks across the Midwest has left him a wash-up alcoholic . . . and a lunger. He's come to home to pay off a few debts, collect on a few debts, and settle into his new prosaic life as a cobbler's apprentice. He realizes, though, that he is not ready to give up on who he is-on what's in his heart. Taking one last bold chance, Lucky dives back into the music scene that has always been his life's blood and his downfall. But can he beat the odds this time? Can he push back against dirty cops, small-town hoodlums, big-time gangsters and corporate sharks? Lucy's winning streak is about to bore a hole through the underbelly of 1950's Madison. Ultimately a humane novel about family and emotional debts, it is also a homage to the fading days of Dixieland jazz and a lost era that still comes alive in the remembered music.