I have not yet read Lisa Wingate's best seller Before We Were Yours, but I had heard positive comments so I was excited to read her newest work of historical fiction, THE BOOK OF LOST FRIENDS. Set mostly in Louisiana, this novel alternates between events of 1875 and 1987. Just after the Civil War, recently freed Hannie disappears with Juneau Jane and Miss Lavinia, half-sisters whose father is Hannie's former owner. It is a perilous journey with Hannie pretending to be a boy as the three of them travel West. Interspersed between chapters are reproductions from Southern papers of "Lost Friends" columns humbly and movingly seeking missing loved ones. Closer to modern day, the story features Benny Silva, a young teacher struggling to make school engaging for her students. She says, "Books were the escape hatch that carried me away during long lonely times .... Books made me believe that smart girls who didn't necessarily fit in with the popular crowd could be the ones to solve mysteries, rescue people in distress, ferret out international criminals, fly spaceships to distant planets, take up arms and fight battles. ... Books built my identity. I want that for my students." I especially liked the modern story with Benny's optimism and the work she did to help make the past relevant for the class and the town. A LibraryReads selection, THE BOOK OF LOST FRIENDS will be welcomed by Wingate's many fans.

“We die once when the last breath leaves our bodies. We die a second time when the last person speaks our name.” Isn’t this the truth. Legacy matters.

This book was great! I’m not usually one for historical novels, but Lisa Wingate did good with this one! The way she knitted the two storylines and linked them together, captivated me.

The character development was good and allowed you to be able to connect with each of them. The writing style was so vivid I could actually imagine the characters in those settings, in my mind. As the reader, I went through a wide range of feelings and emotions while reading this book which obviously leads to a more engaged reading experience.

I would definitely recommend this one!

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC. It took me awhile this time to get around to reading it, but I’m glad I did. And, now it’s available for everyone...so, go get your copy!

Thank you Netgalley, Random House Publishing Group- Ballantine and Lisa Wingate for my Advanced Reader’s digital copy of “The Book of Lost Friends” in exchange for an honest review.

Maybe it’s because I am from the Texas/Louisiana border, but I fell in love with this book. I could picture the landscape, smell the air and hear the accents through Wingate’s descriptions. I savored every bit (but I love a good simile or metaphor and she’s got them in spades).

The story is told by Hannie Gossett in 1887 and Bennie Silva a hundred years later in 1987. Hannie grew up a slave on a Louisiana plantation and was set free after the war. She and those who weren’t traded, remained and worked as sharecroppers. To make sure her old master would honor the sharecropper deal, she heads on an adventure with his two daughters to find him in Texas and look for her remaining family.

In the meantime, Ms Silva is a new English teacher at the local high school trying to motivate her under-privileged students by diving into the towns’ history and genealogy. What gets uncovered in the process is not only secrets but love, family and belonging.

I loved that it jumped back and forth between the two narrators. It gave the reader an insight that only one couldn’t deliver. I was a little surprised how much was jam-packed into the Epilogue wishing it was either fleshed out or left out, specifically about Bennie. The Lost Friends articles were a gem for this historical fiction novel and a wonderful connection from past to future. It really tied the two stories together and made for a wonderful novel.

It wouldn’t be fair if I didn’t share some of my favorite quotes:

"The garden was too far gone after that. Hard times don’t leave money for fine things anyhow. Gate’s been shut ever since the war, the footpaths left for the wisteria and brambles and climbing roses to eat up. Poison ivy drapes the old trees, and hanging moss strings down thick as silk fringes on a ladies’ fan."

"A shaft of sunlight pushes its way through the haze overhead, as if to encourage me to follow. Live oaks shimmer in the golden glow, dripping diamond-like liquid from waxy leaves. Their gnarled branches clutch closer together, moss curtains swaying aimlessly beneath. In thick shadow, the road seems eerie, otherworldly, a passageway to another realm, like Narnia’s wardrobe or Alice’s rabbit hole."

"Lonely perches like a buzzard on my head. It pecks at my eyes so all I can see is a blur outside the window as the half moon blows its breath over the stars, dimming them down."

"My mama might’ve been stole away from me young, but while she could, she spoke all good things into me. Things that lasted. It’s the words a mama says that last the longest of all."

4.5/5

Lisa Wingate's talent shines in this book! I thought Before We Were Yours was her best book. Now, I can't choose either. They are both fantastic!

This had to be a difficult book to write because it was difficult to read at times, but I'm so glad I did!

If you only read one book this year put this one at the top of your list!

This is a very short review because I know if I write much more it will have spoilers! Just read this, that's all I've got to say!

Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book from the publisher. I was not required to write a review. All thoughts and opinions are my own!

Overall, very good read, well written. Yet similar to Before we Were Yours, felt there were bits of story not fully finished. Based on true historical events, made me want to learn more about the real stories of the book of lost friends. I eneded up listening to the audio book as well, that was well done with different voices for different viewpoints.

“The great thing about literature is it’s subjective. No two readers read the same book, because we all see the words through different eyes, filter the story through different life experiences.”

If you’re a fan of dual timelines, characters enraptured with literature, and historical eras, this book could very well be a great one for you to read.

“I listen hard. No sounds by the bayou. The pop-pop of bubbles in the mud, the heavy-throated bullfrog, the skeeters and the blackflies buzzing. Dragonflies hum back and forth over strands of saw grass and muscadine vines. A mockingbird sings his borrowed songs all hooked together like different-colored ribbons tied end after end.”

I thoroughly enjoyed the descriptiveness within most passages and the interlinking between each time period.

“The most important endeavors require a risk.”

The sense of both sadness and hope interwoven drew me into the characters lives’. The willingness and expectation the characters had for themselves to better their lives and the lives of others was inspiring in the midst of their hardships.

“‘We die once when the last breath leaves our bodies. We die a second time when the last person speaks our name.’ The first death is beyond our control, but the second one we can strive to prevent.”

Thank you Random House for this gifted e-copy.

I received this book free of charge from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

I had heard from others that this took a little bit of time to get into. I wasn’t expecting it to take as long as it did. I struggled a bit for probably the first 50% of this book. I understand it was backstory that was building the story, but it was a lot and was hard for me to get interested in.

That being said, the second half of this book was fabulous! It pulled me in and made me keep wanting to read. If you can handle a lot of build up, I recommend taking the time to read this one.

Picking up this book to get a little taste resulted in not putting it down, except when I had to, for two days. Not usually being a fan of current day/flashback fragmented narratives, the stories of freed slave Hannie Gossett (1875) and Benny Silva (1987), had me captivated from the beginning.

Benny Silva arrives in rural Augustine, Louisiana to begin teaching at a school where the last thing anyone wants, including the administration, is to spend any time or money teaching the kids who couldn’t make it into the better school down the road. Wanting to learn more about her new home, and the cemetery across the road, Benny enlists a local woman to come to her class and tell the stories of the women that had come before them and created what no one thought they could.

Hannie Gossett, after being freed, remained on Goswood Grove as a sharecropper. All she has left of her family is a necklace with three blue beads and a hope she will one day be able to bring her family together again.

In a wandering tale, highlighted by the “Lost Friends” advertisements, published in Southern newspapers during the post-Civil War years, which helped newly freed slaves search for loved ones, Hannie and two daughters of the family that once owned her, set out to find the missing patriarch of Gosswood Grove. In doing so, they set a narrative in motion that is not fully revealed until Benny and her students start a much-maligned school project which ties the women of 1875 with her students today.

What I took from this book was an arduous struggle to bring family and community together. A tale of hard-fought freedoms and an understanding of how the past is never really the past and how we owe a debt of gratitude to all who have come before us and what they had to endure to tell their never to be forgotten stories.

I loved this story, if possible, even more than Wingate’s Before We Were Yours. This is another look at the newspaper ads, freed blacks put in a Christian newspaper seeking information about family members. Told in two voices, one of Hanni, a freed slave in 1875 Louisiana and Benedetta, 1987, an English teacher teaching in same small town as the plantation where Hanni was a slave. Hanni’s story is based on an actual Friends advertisement Wingate discovered in her research. Benny struggles with her first year of teaching in this racially/economically divided middle school. She despairs on getting her kids involved in any educational activity until she stumbles on the plantation historical papers and begins a ancestry unit. I loved the story. I loved the outcome. I loved how the historic Lost Friends ads were looking for ancestors of her students. What I have trouble believing is that she was able to turn a hostile school board into letting her continue and actually make a difference in these kids’ lives. I would have loved more clarification on that. This is a book in which you need to read the afterword to understand how Wingate came to write this book.

A powerful story of loss and heartbreak, inspired by historical events, The Book of Lost Friends, is told through the lives of three women. The story begins in Louisiana, 1875, where we meet Hannie, now a freed slave searching for her family members. Her search becomes an adventure as she finds herself joining Lavinia, a spoiled heiress, and her half-sister as they search for their father and possible inheritance. The third woman is Benny Silva, also in rural Louisiana, but now it is 1987. She is a first-year teacher trying to do her best for her students despite lack of resources, chronic absenteeism, hunger, and poverty.

Believable characters with fascinating stories taken from two compelling periods in U.S. history make this a solid, engaging historical fiction novel. Chapters are introduced by actual “Lost Friends” ads posted by family members hoping to reconnect with their relatives following emancipation. These ads were actually published, as well as read by preachers to their congregations, and add a poignant and grounding connection to times.



FYI - I received a copy of this book through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Lisa Wingate does it again! She’s a master story-teller, weaving history and engaging characters to tell often forgotten pieces of our American past. The Book or Lost Friends tells the heart-wrenching yet uplifting story of friends seeking to reconnect in post Civil War South. She brings together stories and timelines, crossing states and years like only she can.

You will not want to put this book down! The characters will hook you and I just love the way she takes a true story from the past and creates an incredible piece of fiction from it.

I highly recommend The Book of Lost Friends to book clubs, historical fiction lovers, Civil War readers, and women who enjoy the bond of friendships

Thank you to NetGalley for this advance copy!

The Deep South 1875, post-Civil War. Hannie is a former slave still working for her former owner, on the promise of receiving some land. Lavinia is the spoiled daughter of Hannie's former owner. A mixed-blood half sister of Lavinia's shows up and all three young women take off to find out who really owns the estate. Hannie, who knows how to read and write, keeps a notebook of people who are searching for their family members.

Bennie is a first-year teacher in 1987, teaching in a poverty-stricken Louisiana school. Trying to find ways to trigger her students' interests, she hits upon historical research of their community. This opens up a lot of trouble for Bennie, as people just want the secrets of the community to remain hidden.

Told in alternating chapters, we learn a great deal about the history of the period following the Civil War. Newspaper advertisements really did appear for people searching for lost relatives, those who might have been sold off or separated from the rest of their families.

A wonderful story that uses a dual timeline to tell the take of a plantation in Louisiana and the lived of the people that populate the area. We'll written.

A good story with lots of research having been done. For me it was tedious. I finally finished it and was glad I did. I don’t know what could of been left out, it was all important due to the heart breaking story of slavery and what it did to families!

I really loved Before We Were Yours by Lisa Wingate and was hoping I'd love this one just as much. I did enjoy the historical aspect of The Book of Lost Friends, but it was slow-going for me and I had a hard time getting into it. I do like when there are two timelines in the story so that wasn't a problem for me.

I was given a copy of this book by the publisher and this is my honest opinion.

Another wonderful book. I love to learn about obscure points of history. The book of lost friends tells about the loss of families when slaves were sold. A very personal story of a young teacher’s journey to find out about the family history that seems every where she turns.

I really love this author! This is the third book of hers I've read and I've learned something new every time. In Book of Lost Friends, we follow a family torn apart from slave trade in the south prior to the Civil War. We also follow a first year teacher assigned to a school deeply affected by the past as she helps the students trace their history in a way that excites and inspires them. Through the use of "lost Friends" ads placed in the Southwestern newspaper, we learn how deeply interconnected the the two timelines are. Lisa Wingate does an excellent job of piecing together bits of history and weaving them into a fictional feast.

As always Lisa Wingate does not disappoint! The Book of Lost Friends is a book about hope and promise, family love and the ties that bind us together. It is the story both of a slave named Hannie who along with her momma, brothers, sisters, aunt and little niece are stolen by their owner's brother-in-law and sold one by one to different families from different areas while being taken to refugee in Texas and the story of a town that for all intents and purposes is still owned by the same slave owning family. It is also the story of a teacher in 1987 who as her first teaching assignment is sent to the local school with poor and broken families, where truancy and hopeless futures are the norm. The Book of Lost Friends purpose is a story about a promise that even if we are separated from those we love we can be found again. We may be older, we may be different but we can be found even if we have passed from this world we can be found. And we are loved.
Thank you Netgalley for the opportunity to read and review this book. The story has touched me in a profound way.

I have not read Lisa Wingate's first book but was able to access The Book of Lost Friends through NetGalley to read and review. I usually love historical fiction but seemed to get lost between the past and present. There are three young women, Hattie, a freed slave, Lavinia, the daughter of plantation where Hattie was born, and Juneau Jane, the illegitimate half-sister of Lavinia. These three go searching for Lavinia's father who is searching for his son and heir. They experience hardships but finally find Lavinia's father on his deathbed and witness the death of Lavinia's brother. Their stories are interwoven with the story of first-year teacher Benedetta Silva, who is working in an extremely poor school in Louisanna and has students who could care less about school. This is until she gets them access to the records of the plantation and family that is central to their town. The stories were good but I felt there was a certain disconnect between them.

Lisa Wingate has a way of grabbing her readers and pulling them into her world, bound by emotion and excitement and nerves and stories that mean something. The Book Of Lost Friends is no exception. It is based on historical ads placed in papers after the civil war to help people find those they had lost. This story follows Hannie, a young woman who hasn’t seen her mama in 12 years. When she finds herself traveling with her former master’s two daughters, one of which was by his mistress, she finds a whole new world. Their journey begins as Hannie is trying to keep the girls from trouble, but trouble seems to be following them. As they travel, they discover the Lost Friends ads and start asking people everywhere they go If they know the people in the ads, if they know Hannie’s family. 100 years later, Benny is trying to teach her high school students in an impoverished Louisiana school that history has an impact on their lives now and on their future. But the small town is working against her, unwilling to look at the more sordid parts of their history. Can she break through and show these kids hope for the future?
Wingate tells a tale of loss and betrayal and love and grace and beauty. I’m so grateful for the chance to hear these stories. I voluntarily read an advanced copy of this book. All opinions are my own.