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Mule Boy
An elegiac novel of men lost in a coal mining disaster and the boy who survives to tell the story
On New Year’s Day, 1929, Ondro Prach, the thirteen-year-old son of Slovak immigrants in Pennsylvania coal country, begins a new job as mule boy. He knows the danger—his father died in the mines—but he is proud of his position handling the animal that hauls cartloads of coal from shafts deep within the earth to the surface. After Ondro earns the trust of the miners and the mule in his charge, the room the men are working collapses and their fate is sealed.
From that moment onward, Ondro carries the hard memory of that day, a burden that leads to addiction and imprisonment, costing him his family. But, years later, when the miners’ loved ones come searching for answers, he finds the strength to share what the men spoke of and prayed for in the pitch black.
Told in incantatory prose set to the rhythm of human breath, this sublime novel turns the memento mori into a meditation not only on death but on what it takes to tunnel through darkness and live.
On New Year’s Day, 1929, Ondro Prach, the thirteen-year-old son of Slovak immigrants in Pennsylvania coal country, begins a new job as mule boy. He knows the danger—his father died in the mines—but he is proud of his position handling the animal that hauls cartloads of coal from shafts deep within the earth to the surface. After Ondro earns the trust of the miners and the mule in his charge, the room the men are working collapses and their fate is sealed.
From that moment onward, Ondro carries the hard memory of that day, a burden that leads to addiction and imprisonment, costing him his family. But, years later, when the miners’ loved ones come searching for answers, he finds the strength to share what the men spoke of and prayed for in the pitch black.
Told in incantatory prose set to the rhythm of human breath, this sublime novel turns the memento mori into a meditation not only on death but on what it takes to tunnel through darkness and live.
192 pages, Paperback
First published February 24, 2026
26 people are currently reading
4624 people want to read
About the author
Andrew Krivak
10 books356 followersThe grandson of Slovak immigrants, Andrew Krivak grew up in Pennsylvania, has lived in London, and has taught at Harvard, Boston College, and the College of the Holy Cross. He lives with his wife and three children in Somerville, Massachusetts and Jaffrey, New Hampshire.
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Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews
August 16, 2025
The wooden rosary beads that belonged to his father, carved from a tree in his homeland before coming to America, the complete works of Shakespeare, the book of Jonah hand written in the Hebrew he learned from his friend Jacobson while in prison, the haunting memories, and the love he has carried in his heart all these years for the little girl Magda, who became the woman he loved. These are the things that Ondro Prach keeps close to him now that he’s an old man living out his last days in the forests of New Hampshire. He recounts his time as a mule boy in the coal mines of Pennsylvania in 1929 when he was 13 years old as he witnesses death when the mine collapses. He becomes the survivor imprisoned by his past throughout his life. We come to know the impact on him as he tells the events of his life.
He recounts the gruesome, grueling details of the miners’ deaths, their last words about their families they would never see again, how they guided Ondro to pick at the rock and move it, to find a place toward light and life for him, as they faced death. It’s gut wrenching to live in his thoughts and even more so as he meets with the surviving families. Almost like a pilgrimage, they come to him many years later to hear what Ondro has witnessed, to know what happened to their father, grandfather or great grandfather, to know their last words.
I first fell for Andrew Krivak’s writing when I read The Sojourn more than ten years ago. My admiration has continued with every novel of his that I’ve read since then. His prose is lyrical as always, but the structure of this one is different than his other novels . It’s an introspective, intense, beautiful and searing stream of consciousness. With the sorrow and grief, there are also moments of joy as Ondro falls in love, reaps great satisfaction from literature and the beauty of the land around him . I fell into the beautiful rhythm of this incredibly affecting story and cried at the beautiful ending.
I received a copy of this from Bellevue Literary Press through Edelweiss
He recounts the gruesome, grueling details of the miners’ deaths, their last words about their families they would never see again, how they guided Ondro to pick at the rock and move it, to find a place toward light and life for him, as they faced death. It’s gut wrenching to live in his thoughts and even more so as he meets with the surviving families. Almost like a pilgrimage, they come to him many years later to hear what Ondro has witnessed, to know what happened to their father, grandfather or great grandfather, to know their last words.
I first fell for Andrew Krivak’s writing when I read The Sojourn more than ten years ago. My admiration has continued with every novel of his that I’ve read since then. His prose is lyrical as always, but the structure of this one is different than his other novels . It’s an introspective, intense, beautiful and searing stream of consciousness. With the sorrow and grief, there are also moments of joy as Ondro falls in love, reaps great satisfaction from literature and the beauty of the land around him . I fell into the beautiful rhythm of this incredibly affecting story and cried at the beautiful ending.
I received a copy of this from Bellevue Literary Press through Edelweiss
February 25, 2026
[5+]
A mule boy is a child-laborer in the 1900s coal mines who carted the coal cars from chamber to chamber. Ondro Prach is the thirteen-year-old in Krivak’s masterpiece who rides Wicked, the mule, proudly doing his work with dignity in a Pennsylvania coal mine in 1929. He’s trying to help out his widowed mother—his father died in a mine accident—and his mother’s sewing work is barely getting them by. Poor Ondro was a child who never knew what it was like to be a child. As this tragic tale unfolds, Ondro is trapped in a mine accident with the brave and skilled miners that he’s always revered.
Now, as an old man, he continues to reflect and ponder on the mine collapse and the men he worked with every day. That pivotal and tragic day led to Ondro’s own collapse—of his spirit, his hopes, and his self-determination. Life became one long prison sentence to him, as he carried this burden of guilt and shame, so sure that he failed his fellow workers. Hope for his soul comes from the most unexpected places, including a gifted and scholarly prisoner who taught him Hebrew and the influence of Parmenides.
In his old age, Ondro is sought out by the families of the miners who didn’t survive. They ask him about the last days and hours of their loved ones’ lives. As Ondro recollects that traumatic event, I gasped at the breadth and scope of how Ondro relives it—an aperture that widens with every word. The magic of this book is in the telling, a reconstruction that stilled me, shook me, held me in the shape that Krivak’s gripping narrative takes. He made the act of self-forgiveness metaphysical.
Ondro’s heavy climb out of his self-made prison is stunning, astonishing in its depth and authenticity. I’m not exaggerating when I say I was sobbing as I turned the pages, first for the darkness of tragedy and then for the glimpse of the light. Despite the elegiac prose—one long sentence without a period (but, yes, there are commas), the pauses are natural. As it states on the book, the prose is set to the rhythm of human breath.
The narrative is magnetic, and you can read this short book in one sitting. However, I was so allured by its magical, mystical, and spiritual story that I took my time, I digested every word. This is an unforgettable tale that I recommend to every literature lover. A thousand thanks to Bellevue Press for sending me an ARC to review. I’d give 10 stars if I could!
“…death is not a destruction of being but a change of state…”
A mule boy is a child-laborer in the 1900s coal mines who carted the coal cars from chamber to chamber. Ondro Prach is the thirteen-year-old in Krivak’s masterpiece who rides Wicked, the mule, proudly doing his work with dignity in a Pennsylvania coal mine in 1929. He’s trying to help out his widowed mother—his father died in a mine accident—and his mother’s sewing work is barely getting them by. Poor Ondro was a child who never knew what it was like to be a child. As this tragic tale unfolds, Ondro is trapped in a mine accident with the brave and skilled miners that he’s always revered.
Now, as an old man, he continues to reflect and ponder on the mine collapse and the men he worked with every day. That pivotal and tragic day led to Ondro’s own collapse—of his spirit, his hopes, and his self-determination. Life became one long prison sentence to him, as he carried this burden of guilt and shame, so sure that he failed his fellow workers. Hope for his soul comes from the most unexpected places, including a gifted and scholarly prisoner who taught him Hebrew and the influence of Parmenides.
In his old age, Ondro is sought out by the families of the miners who didn’t survive. They ask him about the last days and hours of their loved ones’ lives. As Ondro recollects that traumatic event, I gasped at the breadth and scope of how Ondro relives it—an aperture that widens with every word. The magic of this book is in the telling, a reconstruction that stilled me, shook me, held me in the shape that Krivak’s gripping narrative takes. He made the act of self-forgiveness metaphysical.
Ondro’s heavy climb out of his self-made prison is stunning, astonishing in its depth and authenticity. I’m not exaggerating when I say I was sobbing as I turned the pages, first for the darkness of tragedy and then for the glimpse of the light. Despite the elegiac prose—one long sentence without a period (but, yes, there are commas), the pauses are natural. As it states on the book, the prose is set to the rhythm of human breath.
The narrative is magnetic, and you can read this short book in one sitting. However, I was so allured by its magical, mystical, and spiritual story that I took my time, I digested every word. This is an unforgettable tale that I recommend to every literature lover. A thousand thanks to Bellevue Press for sending me an ARC to review. I’d give 10 stars if I could!
“…death is not a destruction of being but a change of state…”
April 13, 2025
What is it that I’ve just read? I daresay, it’s Andrew Krivak’s masterwork.
I rarely anoint a book with the tag “perfect.” But I can honestly not identify one word out of place or one scene that’s superfluous. This book IS perfection, and if I sound as if I’m over-the-top with my praise, it’s just that I’ve rarely read a book with the power to immerse and move me the way this one did. Much as I’ve liked all of Andrew Krivak’s past novels, this one is in a class by itself.
Set in the coal mines of Pennsylvania in the early 1900s, Ondro Prach, the 13-year-old son of a single mother and a father who died in the mines, begins a new job: leading a mule named Wicked (for good reason). The job is precarious – he and the mule are charged with hauling coal from shafts deep within the mine to the surface. Ondro, like most young teens, never wastes a second considering the danger. That is, until the mine collapses.
Plunged into darkness for several days as one by one, the miners and their butties uselessly struggle to live, Ondro emerges in a sort of permanent darkness. He is in a prison of his own making, as the images haunt and shape his life. As we learn from the beginning, as Ondro nears the end of his life, he will be visited by the families of the doomed miners, who will want to know what really happened in those last days. In allowing himself to remember, maybe he will make his own peace.
The prose is so elegiac and incantatory that I felt “twinned” with Ondro, feeling what he did, seeing what he did, unable to lift myself from the page. Although I am not a woman of faith, I know that Andrew Krivak, who wrote a spiritual memoir, has been on a lifelong journey to respond to the promptings of God and to surrender to His will. In creating a novel this remarkable, about tunneling through the worst of times and never giving up on what gives life meaning, I think he has accomplished his goal. I cannot thank Bellevue Literary Press enough for allowing me to be an early reader in exchange for an honest review. This book will not be published until early 2026, and readers have a real treat in store for them.
I rarely anoint a book with the tag “perfect.” But I can honestly not identify one word out of place or one scene that’s superfluous. This book IS perfection, and if I sound as if I’m over-the-top with my praise, it’s just that I’ve rarely read a book with the power to immerse and move me the way this one did. Much as I’ve liked all of Andrew Krivak’s past novels, this one is in a class by itself.
Set in the coal mines of Pennsylvania in the early 1900s, Ondro Prach, the 13-year-old son of a single mother and a father who died in the mines, begins a new job: leading a mule named Wicked (for good reason). The job is precarious – he and the mule are charged with hauling coal from shafts deep within the mine to the surface. Ondro, like most young teens, never wastes a second considering the danger. That is, until the mine collapses.
Plunged into darkness for several days as one by one, the miners and their butties uselessly struggle to live, Ondro emerges in a sort of permanent darkness. He is in a prison of his own making, as the images haunt and shape his life. As we learn from the beginning, as Ondro nears the end of his life, he will be visited by the families of the doomed miners, who will want to know what really happened in those last days. In allowing himself to remember, maybe he will make his own peace.
The prose is so elegiac and incantatory that I felt “twinned” with Ondro, feeling what he did, seeing what he did, unable to lift myself from the page. Although I am not a woman of faith, I know that Andrew Krivak, who wrote a spiritual memoir, has been on a lifelong journey to respond to the promptings of God and to surrender to His will. In creating a novel this remarkable, about tunneling through the worst of times and never giving up on what gives life meaning, I think he has accomplished his goal. I cannot thank Bellevue Literary Press enough for allowing me to be an early reader in exchange for an honest review. This book will not be published until early 2026, and readers have a real treat in store for them.
Review of advance copy
Ondro Prach is a 13-year-old Slovka American boy who works as a handler for his mule, Wicked, in a Pennsylvania coal mine in 1929 when the mine collapses and he alone survives. Ondro tells the story in haunting prose about the disaster and aftermath that shapes his life. In his seventies, Ondro is contacted by some of the relatives of the men who were buried underground for his last memories of the people who died. Ondro's life is filled with the horrors he witnessed and a survivor's guilt that colors this life. This is a very poignant novel about a child who witnessed horrors that defined his remaining years.
May 7, 2025
thank you to edelweiss for the drc! 20 pages in, i was like, ooh, this is kind of hard to read, I'm not sure if I like it. But by the end, I was literally in chills almost crying at work, so I feel like that stands by itself as a review.
On top of the crazy emotional journey this takes you on, the prose is also just so fantastic - and I had high expectations, because Krivak's The Bear has some of my favorite pieces of prose ever, but despite the completely different tone, this really, really makes you feel like you're stepping where the character steps, breathing the same air, hearing the same sounds, feeling the same feelings. I can't stress enough how different my life is from Ondro's (case in point: I had to google at least one word per page) but I felt so connected to him, especially the parts illustrating his life as an older man. There's just something about it, man. Sure, this was made for me in many ways - an intense character study, a funky style, an unflinching look at the Horrors - but I think there's so much to discover in this text, and I can't wait for other people with different perspectives to read this and tell me what they found.
While I wait a billion years (okay, less than one year) for this to pub, I'm going to work my way through Krivak's backlist. His writing really is singular, and I can't wait to see what else I discover!
On top of the crazy emotional journey this takes you on, the prose is also just so fantastic - and I had high expectations, because Krivak's The Bear has some of my favorite pieces of prose ever, but despite the completely different tone, this really, really makes you feel like you're stepping where the character steps, breathing the same air, hearing the same sounds, feeling the same feelings. I can't stress enough how different my life is from Ondro's (case in point: I had to google at least one word per page) but I felt so connected to him, especially the parts illustrating his life as an older man. There's just something about it, man. Sure, this was made for me in many ways - an intense character study, a funky style, an unflinching look at the Horrors - but I think there's so much to discover in this text, and I can't wait for other people with different perspectives to read this and tell me what they found.
While I wait a billion years (okay, less than one year) for this to pub, I'm going to work my way through Krivak's backlist. His writing really is singular, and I can't wait to see what else I discover!
June 18, 2025
Attention fans of Andrew Krivak! Although it doesn’t come out until February 2026, “Mule Boy”, is an utterly beautiful, lyrical, heartbreaking, yet soul-lifting short novel! Pre-order it so you won’t miss it!
Ondro Prach, now an old man, is relaying the story of what happened when he was a thirteen-year-old “Mule Boy” in a Pennsylvanian coal mine collapse in 1929. His memories beautifully and vividly convey the darkness, the danger, the fear, the comradery, and the mysterious rules of the mines.
Krivak’s poetic prose will not only bring you into the dark confines of the mine, but it will also let you into Ondro’s life-long “prison of the mind” as the only survivor.
Krivak fans (and I am clearly one) will immediately notice that this novel is different than any of his others. Readers, allow yourself to surrender to the stream of Ondro’s storytelling and his memories and be assured that he will sweep you away. This is the type of novel that is easy to read in one sitting because you will not want to break the spell.
As an old man living in a remote forest by a pond, relatives of the other men who were in the mine with him begin to make pilgrimages to him in order to ask about their loved one’s deaths and last words. Make no mistake, this is a book about death, but the uplifting theme is that death is not “no more” it’s just a passing into another realm of being and “where you begin, there you will return again.”
I very rarely cry reading novels anymore, but Krivak ALWAYS manages to raise at least one lump to my throat in every novel…this one had several moments like that – including the last line of the “Acknowledgements”! That’s a first!
Many thanks to Bellevue Literary Press for an Advanced Reader’s Copy of this treasure by the inimitable Andrew Krivak.
Ondro Prach, now an old man, is relaying the story of what happened when he was a thirteen-year-old “Mule Boy” in a Pennsylvanian coal mine collapse in 1929. His memories beautifully and vividly convey the darkness, the danger, the fear, the comradery, and the mysterious rules of the mines.
Krivak’s poetic prose will not only bring you into the dark confines of the mine, but it will also let you into Ondro’s life-long “prison of the mind” as the only survivor.
Krivak fans (and I am clearly one) will immediately notice that this novel is different than any of his others. Readers, allow yourself to surrender to the stream of Ondro’s storytelling and his memories and be assured that he will sweep you away. This is the type of novel that is easy to read in one sitting because you will not want to break the spell.
As an old man living in a remote forest by a pond, relatives of the other men who were in the mine with him begin to make pilgrimages to him in order to ask about their loved one’s deaths and last words. Make no mistake, this is a book about death, but the uplifting theme is that death is not “no more” it’s just a passing into another realm of being and “where you begin, there you will return again.”
I very rarely cry reading novels anymore, but Krivak ALWAYS manages to raise at least one lump to my throat in every novel…this one had several moments like that – including the last line of the “Acknowledgements”! That’s a first!
Many thanks to Bellevue Literary Press for an Advanced Reader’s Copy of this treasure by the inimitable Andrew Krivak.
March 6, 2026
This was entrancing. I love when a novel drops you into a specialized trade/subculture/etc. with so much jargon that isn't explained because we're as steeped in the world as the protagonist. It felt so immersive - I felt so tense and claustrophobic and yet I trusted the miners because I knew, through Ondro's deep respect for them, they knew what they were doing...I kept forgetting and then remembering that he would be the only survivor. I love how it balanced the different time periods and how much Ondro's entire life was impacted by those few days. Just dizzying. Thank you Sophie for singing this book's praises before it came out and getting it on my radar!
Review of advance copy
interview with andrew krivak coming soon to npr's weekend edition
March 4, 2026
4.5 Stars - a quiet novel that asks the reader to slow down. The lack of periods and quotation marks takes effort, and I often had to reread to figure out what was happening, but the rhythm eventually settles in. This book is more about how it feels to be in the story than about moving through plot. It reminded me of The Road and Seascraper in that way. It took some patience, but I’m glad I read it.
Read
January 9, 2026Mule Boy is a hauntingly beautiful exploration of survival, memory, and the human spirit in the face of tragedy. Andrew Krivak’s prose flows like poetry, capturing the rhythms of the coal mines, the weight of grief, and the innocence of a boy forced into adulthood far too early. Ondro Prach’s journey, from pride and hope as a young mule boy to the burdens of loss, addiction, and imprisonment, is rendered with devastating honesty and emotional depth.
Krivak’s storytelling transforms historical tragedy into a meditation on resilience, responsibility, and the legacies we carry. The narrative is intimate yet universal, drawing readers into the darkness of the mines and the light of human endurance. Mule Boy is a profound read for lovers of historical fiction who appreciate elegant writing and emotionally resonant storytelling.
Krivak’s storytelling transforms historical tragedy into a meditation on resilience, responsibility, and the legacies we carry. The narrative is intimate yet universal, drawing readers into the darkness of the mines and the light of human endurance. Mule Boy is a profound read for lovers of historical fiction who appreciate elegant writing and emotionally resonant storytelling.
March 2, 2026
This is a rivetingly beautiful book which I think will haunt me for some time.
Ondro Prach is an old man living a solitary life in the forests of New Hampshire. He narrates his life story beginning with a pivotal event when he was 13 years old. On New Year’s Day of 1929, Ondro, the son of Slovak immigrants, after two years of working in a coal mine in Pennsylvania, has been promoted to a mule boy. He handles a mule that hauls cartloads of coal from shafts deep within the mine. When a roof collapses, Ondro is trapped with four other men. He is the only one who escapes. The memory of that day is a burden that has a negative impact on his life: he escapes the mine but becomes a prisoner of his past, unable to escape the tragedy that defined his life. Many years later, he is visited by the miners’ loved ones seeking answers to the men’s last hours. He shares what he remembers, offering healing to the descendants, and finds healing and peace himself.
When I first began the novel, I struggled. It’s written in stream-of-consciousness style; there’s not one period in the entire book, though there are commas which suggest breaths taken by the speaker. I gradually got into the rhythm of the fluid, lyrical prose and ended up finding myself totally immersed, swept away by what is described as “incantatory prose set to the rhythm of human breath.”
This is a novel about tunneling through the worst of times. Because Ondro carries the burden of a terrible trauma, his life becomes a virtual prison sentence: “I went to prison not for what I had done but for what I had failed to do, hidden in a room deep below the ground where I did not find God and God did not find me, and I have wondered if this is what I have been asked to carry for the rest of my life, if there is life in this.” He is obviously suffering with survivor’s guilt. He fears that his life has no meaning; he has a deep fear of the dark, “not the dark in which there is no light but the dark in which there is nothing, no thing.”
Eventually he comes to understand the need to accept life with all it offers, whether horrors and grief and guilt or beauty and peace: “if you are alive, alone or with others, in the dark or in the light, imprisoned or walking freely, it is life right up to the last breath.” A friend speaks to him about the Book of Jonah in which Jonah is swallowed by a big fish, as Ondro was swallowed by the earth. Jonah needs to learn “about God’s mercy and magnanimity” and Ondro needs to be reminded of this as well and to forgive himself. It’s interesting that a miner keeps telling Ondro “ňestaraj śe” which translates as “don’t worry anymore” in a Slovak dialect, a different way perhaps of suggesting that God will provide.
Ondro also comes to terms with death. A friend teaches him that “death is not a destruction of being but a change of state” so “fear of death was weak and unfounded because there is no not being and this is the only way we can live life and not fear death, knowing that to become nothing is impossible and that what matters is the being our bodies consist of and death is simply a change.” (This made me think of an article I once read about how the atoms and energy particles that make up a living person persist in the universe, effectively changing form rather than vanishing. Based on the law of conservation of energy, the energy within a human body cannot be destroyed upon death, only transformed.)
This book really impressed me. With its focus on the burden of being the sole survivor of a tragedy, it is obviously sad, but it also emphasizes the possibility of redemption. I tend not to reread books, but this one certainly deserves a second look.
Please check out my reader's blog (https://schatjesshelves.blogspot.com/).
Ondro Prach is an old man living a solitary life in the forests of New Hampshire. He narrates his life story beginning with a pivotal event when he was 13 years old. On New Year’s Day of 1929, Ondro, the son of Slovak immigrants, after two years of working in a coal mine in Pennsylvania, has been promoted to a mule boy. He handles a mule that hauls cartloads of coal from shafts deep within the mine. When a roof collapses, Ondro is trapped with four other men. He is the only one who escapes. The memory of that day is a burden that has a negative impact on his life: he escapes the mine but becomes a prisoner of his past, unable to escape the tragedy that defined his life. Many years later, he is visited by the miners’ loved ones seeking answers to the men’s last hours. He shares what he remembers, offering healing to the descendants, and finds healing and peace himself.
When I first began the novel, I struggled. It’s written in stream-of-consciousness style; there’s not one period in the entire book, though there are commas which suggest breaths taken by the speaker. I gradually got into the rhythm of the fluid, lyrical prose and ended up finding myself totally immersed, swept away by what is described as “incantatory prose set to the rhythm of human breath.”
This is a novel about tunneling through the worst of times. Because Ondro carries the burden of a terrible trauma, his life becomes a virtual prison sentence: “I went to prison not for what I had done but for what I had failed to do, hidden in a room deep below the ground where I did not find God and God did not find me, and I have wondered if this is what I have been asked to carry for the rest of my life, if there is life in this.” He is obviously suffering with survivor’s guilt. He fears that his life has no meaning; he has a deep fear of the dark, “not the dark in which there is no light but the dark in which there is nothing, no thing.”
Eventually he comes to understand the need to accept life with all it offers, whether horrors and grief and guilt or beauty and peace: “if you are alive, alone or with others, in the dark or in the light, imprisoned or walking freely, it is life right up to the last breath.” A friend speaks to him about the Book of Jonah in which Jonah is swallowed by a big fish, as Ondro was swallowed by the earth. Jonah needs to learn “about God’s mercy and magnanimity” and Ondro needs to be reminded of this as well and to forgive himself. It’s interesting that a miner keeps telling Ondro “ňestaraj śe” which translates as “don’t worry anymore” in a Slovak dialect, a different way perhaps of suggesting that God will provide.
Ondro also comes to terms with death. A friend teaches him that “death is not a destruction of being but a change of state” so “fear of death was weak and unfounded because there is no not being and this is the only way we can live life and not fear death, knowing that to become nothing is impossible and that what matters is the being our bodies consist of and death is simply a change.” (This made me think of an article I once read about how the atoms and energy particles that make up a living person persist in the universe, effectively changing form rather than vanishing. Based on the law of conservation of energy, the energy within a human body cannot be destroyed upon death, only transformed.)
This book really impressed me. With its focus on the burden of being the sole survivor of a tragedy, it is obviously sad, but it also emphasizes the possibility of redemption. I tend not to reread books, but this one certainly deserves a second look.
Please check out my reader's blog (https://schatjesshelves.blogspot.com/).
Review of advance copy received from Publisher
…and he told me not to worry, he always said, Ondro, nestaraja se, and asked me in the end what I was afraid of, if it was fear that was overtaking me, and I told him I was afraid of being alone down there, still alive, and all of the others dead, and he said, Yes, that is something to fear, but if you are alive, alone or with others, in the dark or in the light, imprisoned or walking freely, it is life right up to the last breath… from Mule Boy by Andrew Krivak
I closed the book with my heart breaking, filled with the horror of what a thirteen-year-old boy had to do to stay alive, and yet filled with a sense of acceptance and peace that the world has its terrors but it also has its moments of beauty.
Written without sentences, the story spools out without hardly a breath, keeping me turning pages.
Ondro’s father has died in the mines and he soon is given work in the dark, working his way up to mule boy, leading the mule pulling the cars of coal. He is thirteen when the roof fell in, trapping him with four miners. Over the course of several days, as the miners die one by one, Ondro endeavors to pull away the rocks, finding a way out.
Survival comes with new burdens. He goes to college, drinks too much, falls in love with the daughter of one of the miners he saw die, ends up in prison during WWII for refusing to fight. During his incarceration, he loses his beloved wife to a grifter but meets a man who teaches him philosophy, Hebrew and the book of Jonah, and Shakespeare.
In his old age, Ondro is visited by the families of each of the miners he saw die, all asking him to tell how they died. And finally, he tells how he survived.
This is a book I could read over and over to fully comprehend it’s messages and understand the magic of how Krivak fashioned it. It is haunting, beautiful, and profound.
Thanks to the publisher for a free book.
I closed the book with my heart breaking, filled with the horror of what a thirteen-year-old boy had to do to stay alive, and yet filled with a sense of acceptance and peace that the world has its terrors but it also has its moments of beauty.
Written without sentences, the story spools out without hardly a breath, keeping me turning pages.
Ondro’s father has died in the mines and he soon is given work in the dark, working his way up to mule boy, leading the mule pulling the cars of coal. He is thirteen when the roof fell in, trapping him with four miners. Over the course of several days, as the miners die one by one, Ondro endeavors to pull away the rocks, finding a way out.
Survival comes with new burdens. He goes to college, drinks too much, falls in love with the daughter of one of the miners he saw die, ends up in prison during WWII for refusing to fight. During his incarceration, he loses his beloved wife to a grifter but meets a man who teaches him philosophy, Hebrew and the book of Jonah, and Shakespeare.
In his old age, Ondro is visited by the families of each of the miners he saw die, all asking him to tell how they died. And finally, he tells how he survived.
This is a book I could read over and over to fully comprehend it’s messages and understand the magic of how Krivak fashioned it. It is haunting, beautiful, and profound.
Thanks to the publisher for a free book.
February 28, 2026
I'm usually put off by what I call 'Cormac McCarthy syndrome' - the tendency to write sentences and paragraphs with proper punctuation or quote marks for dialogue.
So I struggled to get into the story at first, until I grew accustomed to the first person narrator's stream of consciousness delivery. After the initial setup of his early childhood, once he goes into the coal mines as a young boy things get interesting. Then a mine collapses, and then things get really interesting, both in tension and in narrative style.
It is clear that the narrator is telling this as an old man, and his retelling moves back and forth. Pieces of the mine disaster and the fate of the five of them underground are detailed gradually, as descendants of the miners visit him in old age to find out what happened to their fathers or grandfathers that day. It's quite an effective way of storytelling, parceling the story out by focusing on the fates of individuals underground. The 'voice' of Ondro Prach, the mule boy, comes through strongly in the book.
As a survivor of the disaster, Ondro has to deal with survivor guilt. His life afterwards is troubled and the best relationship in his life turns sour. The resolution at the end of the book is heartwarming and we hope for the best for this survivor of extreme trauma whose life has never really moved beyond that horrible day in the mine.
So I struggled to get into the story at first, until I grew accustomed to the first person narrator's stream of consciousness delivery. After the initial setup of his early childhood, once he goes into the coal mines as a young boy things get interesting. Then a mine collapses, and then things get really interesting, both in tension and in narrative style.
It is clear that the narrator is telling this as an old man, and his retelling moves back and forth. Pieces of the mine disaster and the fate of the five of them underground are detailed gradually, as descendants of the miners visit him in old age to find out what happened to their fathers or grandfathers that day. It's quite an effective way of storytelling, parceling the story out by focusing on the fates of individuals underground. The 'voice' of Ondro Prach, the mule boy, comes through strongly in the book.
As a survivor of the disaster, Ondro has to deal with survivor guilt. His life afterwards is troubled and the best relationship in his life turns sour. The resolution at the end of the book is heartwarming and we hope for the best for this survivor of extreme trauma whose life has never really moved beyond that horrible day in the mine.
March 6, 2026
5 ⭐️
"Mule Boy" is a historical fiction novel about a boy who is the sole survivor of a Pennsylvania Mine Disaster on New Year's Day in 1929.
Each chapter is set up like one long run-on sentence, which at first seemed a little off-putting, but it honestly works with the cadence of the writing. It's a slow march, kind of like the push and pull of waves along the seashore during calm seas.
It's truly a remarkable story of both triumph and failure; full of perseverance, hope, love and forgiveness.
Growing up in the heart of Appalachia among coal fields and with family working in the mines, this story was especially impactful for me. I also lived just 2.5 miles from where the Sago Mine Disaster took place on January 2nd, 2006 and remember hearing what sounded like thunder that morning which turned out to be an underground explosion that killed and trapped 13 miners for two days, with only one survivor. One of the deceased was the brother-in-law of a close cousin of mine. It's a tragedy that still greatly affects the families and our community even now, 20 years later.
"Mule Boy" is a historical fiction novel about a boy who is the sole survivor of a Pennsylvania Mine Disaster on New Year's Day in 1929.
Each chapter is set up like one long run-on sentence, which at first seemed a little off-putting, but it honestly works with the cadence of the writing. It's a slow march, kind of like the push and pull of waves along the seashore during calm seas.
It's truly a remarkable story of both triumph and failure; full of perseverance, hope, love and forgiveness.
Growing up in the heart of Appalachia among coal fields and with family working in the mines, this story was especially impactful for me. I also lived just 2.5 miles from where the Sago Mine Disaster took place on January 2nd, 2006 and remember hearing what sounded like thunder that morning which turned out to be an underground explosion that killed and trapped 13 miners for two days, with only one survivor. One of the deceased was the brother-in-law of a close cousin of mine. It's a tragedy that still greatly affects the families and our community even now, 20 years later.
August 7, 2025
Set in 1929, beginning on New Year's Day, this story shares the lives of the men that begin in the coal mines, as well as a boy who is thirteen, who takes on the task of a 'mule boy', as this begins, even knowing the fact that his own father had lost his life in the mines. Still, he is hopeful that he can make a difference in his own life, and perhaps in other's lives, as well.
Andrew Krivak has written a very moving, often heartbreaking, story, but there is also so much beauty in his words, as well.
Pub Date: 24 Feb 2026
Many thanks for the opportunity to read Andrew Krivak's 'Mule'
Review of advance copy received from Publisher
Amazing, poetic story of the life of a man who, as a boy, survived a coal mine disaster. Reading this book was challenging at first, since it is told in prose with no sentences - not a single period in it - but after awhile, the voice made its way inside me and I was enthralled.
I'll be writing a longer review later when I've had time to fully absorb this masterpiece. Suffice it to say, for now, that I've rarely read a book this well-written. The story is achingly sad, but ultimately triumphant - well worth the agony that this boy (and man) has to go through to get to the reward at the end. Just a thoroughly beautiful story.
I'll be writing a longer review later when I've had time to fully absorb this masterpiece. Suffice it to say, for now, that I've rarely read a book this well-written. The story is achingly sad, but ultimately triumphant - well worth the agony that this boy (and man) has to go through to get to the reward at the end. Just a thoroughly beautiful story.
February 13, 2026
A windy prose that feels like Ondro is still out of breath after retelling his escape from the mines— and his ‘abandonment’ of his coworkers decades later to his late coworkers families. I don’t live too far from the stories location and it’s quite eerie to see the darkness that history has left on the town.
February 27, 2026
This book is miles away from my typical genres and while I didn’t love the storyline, the prose and order of the book was amazing. The writing flowed in a way that genuinely made the book hard to put down.
March 7, 2026
Well! What a read this is. Upsetting, heartwarming and emotional. What a ride. Loved this book.
Totally different from what I normally read and 1 I picked to read for the 52 Book Challenge. Not disappointed. Would recommend.
Totally different from what I normally read and 1 I picked to read for the 52 Book Challenge. Not disappointed. Would recommend.
Review of advance copy
Thanks to whoever donated the ARC to my LFL outside my house. This is a luminous heart-stopping book that I read in one sitting. Highly recommend.
February 28, 2026
Beautifully pieced together. Loved the choice of writing style. Just stunning.
March 5, 2026
At times this was one star, at times it was four stars for me. Not sure how I feel about incantatory prose.
March 9, 2026
Krivak never ceases to amaze me with his storytelling and unmatched prose. He's quickly become one of my favorite authors.
Review of advance copy received from Publisher
Thirteen year old Ondro Prach has followed in his father's footsteps to work in a Pennsylvania coal mine. His job is to handle the mule, Wicked and haul cartloads of coal from the shafts to the surface. On New Years Day 1929, the room in which he and three other men are working collapses. Ondro lives but the burden of that survival imprisons him in his grief.
Elegant language and masterful pacing set Krivak's narrative far and above most other novels. His deeply human characters evoke so much emotion that there were instances when my eyes often filled with tears and I had to catch my breath more than once.
I truly have not read a book so skillfully told with such glorious prose in a very long time.
Mule Boy is fairly flawless.
I am eternally grateful to Bellevue Literary Press for the opportunity to be an early reader of this amazing novel.
Elegant language and masterful pacing set Krivak's narrative far and above most other novels. His deeply human characters evoke so much emotion that there were instances when my eyes often filled with tears and I had to catch my breath more than once.
I truly have not read a book so skillfully told with such glorious prose in a very long time.
Mule Boy is fairly flawless.
I am eternally grateful to Bellevue Literary Press for the opportunity to be an early reader of this amazing novel.
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