How to Lose the Lottery by Jay McKenzie

What would you do if you won the lottery? Buy a new house, a new car, a new life? That’s where Jay McKenzie’s debut novel begins. Overnight, Edie and Ron go from scraping by to becoming multi-millionaires. 

Edie, however, feels something is missing, something she can’t buy. Unexpectedly, she finds herself missing her old life more than she thought she would. 

Told through Edie's perspective, the novel is structured into six sections, one for each winning number, with chapters alternating between ‘before’ and ‘after’.In the past, we watch Edie and Ron meet in the 1960s and build a working-class life held together by grit, routine and compromise. In the present, their sudden wealth brings luxury, space and freedom. But it also magnifies what’s been left unsaid for years. Ron disappears into new cars and their son Colin moves in after his divorce and thrives in the upgrade. Their other son, Sean, remains a painful absence that no one names.

Edie is the heart of the novel. She’s warm, flawed, but believable, shaped by a difficult childhood that includes a mother with mental health struggles and an absent father. You can feel the weight of this in her lack of self confidence; she doubts her own judgement, struggles to voice her needs and is torn between duty and the possibility of choosing a life that’s truly her own. However, she has a quiet, fierce determination to do better. Slowly, we see another Edie emerge. Tentatively, she begins to make her own decisions and finally puts her own happiness first. The lottery win doesn’t transform her life in the way we expect, but it becomes a dramatic turning point. 

Ron and Colin are less sympathetic, which feels intentional and the supporting characters add to the story’s depth. I particularly enjoyed meeting the wonderful Veroushka, who brings humour at just the right moments.

By the end, How to Lose the Lottery becomes a thoughtful novel about the long reach of childhood, sibling tensions, class and social disparity, and the ways families keep secrets, even from themselves. It also asks big questions without ever feeling heavy-handed: does money buy happiness? Can we outrun the past? Is it ever too late to put things right?

Follow Jay McKenzie online.

Reviewer: Andrea Molloy

Harper Collins