The Winner

The Winner is a 1998 novel by American author David Baldacci. Set in rural Georgia, it follows LuAnn Tyler, a poor single mother living in a trailer park who is wrongly accused of murder. Desperate to escape, but finding no way out, LuAnn’s luck changes dramatically when she is approached by a criminal mastermind known as Jackson who is orchestrating a scam within the National Lottery. Jackson offers to help LuAnn get rich on the condition that she leaves the United States forever. When LuAnn returns a decade later, she is noticed by an investigative reporter and targeted by Jackson, who is bent on eliminating the witnesses to his crimes. The novel explores how one woman’s determination and resourcefulness can overcome the greed and deception of people who work to undermine her.

The plot of The Winner unfolds from the perspectives of both LuAnn and the criminal who calls himself Jackson. A once-precocious child and survivor of severe abuse, Jackson was born into a wealthy family that went from riches to rags before his eyes. Somewhere down the line, Jackson, believing that he could resolve his trauma by restoring his family’s wealth, put his brilliant mind to use making as much money as possible through criminal schemes. So far, he has pulled off several moneymaking plots that are virtually untraceable. The common denominator of his strategy is his coercion of people who are innocent and desperate for help, exploiting their vulnerabilities to make them his pawns. Jackson singles out LuAnn as his latest pawn, knowing that people in deep poverty will do practically anything to get by.

LuAnn, unlike Jackson, has worked her entire life to scrape by, and lives in a derelict home in the trailer park, subsisting off rationed food. Nonetheless, she is willful and resilient and hopeful for her future and that of her daughter, Lisa. One day, LuAnn’s life comes crashing down when she gets mixed up in her boyfriend’s drug deal. The deal escalates into violence, and her boyfriend is murdered. The resulting investigation identifies LuAnn as a primary suspect. To escape the law, LuAnn agrees to work for Jackson. Jackson has her purchase a lottery ticket and relay the number to him. He uses his contacts at the National Lottery to tweak the system so that her ticket wins, and takes a huge chunk of the winnings. Using his other shady connections, he arranges for LuAnn to flee the country, thereby getting rid of his only connection to the lottery theft.



For a decade, LuAnn lives abroad in financial comfort, constantly under pressure to conceal her identity. Eventually, tiring of her life on the run, she returns to the United States—breaking her agreement with Jackson. A famous investigative reporter, Thomas Donovan, picks up her trail and starts to look deeper into her lottery winning. He begins to suspect that the system was rigged. In a scramble to prevent anyone from prying further into his crime, Jackson begins to systematically kill off every possible witness, including LuAnn and Lisa. This forces the two to go on the run again. LuAnn meets a mysterious man named Matthew Riggs, a former FBI agent. Matt uses his connections to help forge a deal with the Bureau in which LuAnn gives information on Jackson in exchange for her protection and the avoidance of a prison sentence. As the search for Jackson evolves, she and Matt accidentally fall in love. At the end of the novel, LuAnn and Lisa move in with Matt and Lisa’s friend Charlie. LuAnn again looks toward her future with hope, knowing that her raw determination will continue to pay off.