"Collins debuts with a finely tuned tale of artistic ambition and cultural shifts in the 1970s Texas music scene…Brilliantly conveys the nitty-gritty details of a working musician’s day-to-day. Music lovers will especially dig this.”
--Kirkus Reviews


“The old, weird Austin is not dead! It's alive and kicking on the pages of Callie Collins's beautiful novel, a soulful, funny and note-perfect ode to that renegade city and to the righteous music that made it what it is. Fans of Denis Johnson and Willy Vlautin will DEVOUR.”
– Kevin Barry, author of Night Boat to Tangier and The Heart in Winter


"Callie Collins summons 1970s Austin and the Rush Creek Saloon with such tangibility, such heft, they feel as real to me as if I had lived within them. Her debut is gorgeously written and unflinchingly wise. This book and its characters have my heart."
--Stacey Swann, author of Olympus, Texas


"Walk Softly On This Heart of Mine marks a brilliant debut. Collins is a natural story-teller, inhabiting voices and settings with preternatural grace and intimacy. There's a hard-luck humanity and down-home soulfulness to this evocation of Texas life that puts me in mind of Larry McMurtry."
--Peter Ho Davies, author of The Fortunes