Once in Every Lifetime

Once in Every Lifetime is a novel by the Scottish writer Tom Hanlin first published in 1945.

[1][2][3][4][5][6][7] This debut novel by a then unknown Scottish miner sold 250,000 copies in the United Kingdom in the first three weeks of publication.

[6][8] It also won the £500 first prize in the Big Ben Books Competition,[6][9] and was translated into more than a dozen languages.

[10] Norman Collins, writing in the Observer, wrote that "his novel is an idyll of young love that somehow became sour and unlovely amid the grim landscape of the pitheads.

"[5] John Steinbeck also spoke enthusiastically of the author, declaring the book "excellent.