A Kate Burkholder novella. Not integral to the rest of the series, but a delightful treat to keep people wanting more from the author. I like Castillo's habit of now putting out a novella before the next full length novel is due. It makes the wait seem shorter and has us anticipating more. You can never have too much of Kate Burkholder and Painters Mill.

I love this series and it's characters so it was nice to have a little more of them, but it was a little too short. There really wasn't much time for the mystery to truly evolve and play out well.

Not long enough- her wonderful stories suck you in from the first page.

Alma was excited as she was meeting her boyfriend that night at a party and she was sure he would ask her to marry him. Alma was Amish and her parents approved of Aden apart from his noisy car. But they weren’t aware that the huge party would be much more than Alma told them.

Irene, Alma’s best friend kept her company until she was to meet Aden in the barn after he’d finished work. But when Aden arrived he found Alma unconscious and bleeding from a head wound.

Chief of Police of Painters Mill Kate Burkholder was finding this Friday 13th had more than the usual “events” to keep the local police busy, including a complete power outage for the town, but when she was called to the old Davenport place because of a wild party, she had no idea she’d find a young Amish woman unresponsive. But would Kate be able to discover the perpetrator?

Only the Lucky is a short story (#8.5 in the Kate Burkholder series) by Linda Castillo, and just enough to whet her reader’s appetites until the next full length novel is published :) And I thoroughly enjoyed it! I love this series and can’t wait for the next. Highly recommended.

Only the Lucky is a Kate Burkholder novella that is only 56 pages long. This is a quick visit to Painters Mill to meet up with Kate and the rest of the characters I have grown to love, to solve the crime of assault on a young Amish girl at a wild party.

It is Friday the 13th in Painters Mill and the problems just keep on coming one after another. An Amish gentleman visits Kate at the station to tell her about trespassers and a possible gathering taking place at an old abandoned farm. After an accident that causes a complete power outage in Painters Mill and the surrounding areas, Kate gets a report that an Amish teenage girl has been found unresponsive in the barn on the above mentioned property by her boyfriend at the party. The party is huge, wild with a lot of underage drinking and drugs.

It is an entertaining story, but if you are not already familiar with the main series characters you may feel there is much missing. The crime was easily solved, but still a good read. This is 8.5 in the series and has kept me interested to find out what will happen next with Kate and the town of Painters Mill.

Awesome novella! Not all authors can write a short story that's interesting, well-formed and entertaining. ...Apparently, Linda can!!

A Kate Burkholder short. Probably the only book in this series, well technically a story, that I have not rated a four. Most of our families characters are there and the storyline does feature an attack on a young Amish girl but not enough time really to create that special atmosphere and intrigue. I did like it though, it was definitely a quick read but guessed the who done it way before the end.

ARC from Netgalley.

This excellent short story is a welcome addition to the Kate Burkholder series!!! Few authors are capable of involving the reader as completely in their short fiction as in their novels. Linda Castillo is a welcome exception. I got caught up in the story so quickly I finished it in record time. Castillo is particularly adept at describing characters so they are totally realistic even if one hasn't read other books in this series and doesn't know their full stories. "Only the Lucky" definitely whets my appetite for the next book in the series!!

I have been reading Linda Castillo since her first book. I really like this series and the relationship between the characters.. Again, I just wish this was a regular length book instead of a novella

It was so good to get a taste of being back in Painters Mill with Kate Burkholder in advance of the release of the next book in this series, Down a Dark Road, coming out July 11! This is one of my favorite series. This short story is a very quick read, and if you've read the rest of the series, it's worth the small time investment. Not recommended if you haven't read the series before as there is no time wasted identifying characters or giving backstory on the town.

A traffic accident, a huge party and a badly injured Amish girl keep police chief Kate Burkholder busy in this short story that will help hold fans of the series over until the full length novel is released later this year