The best title for this book would be Lost Found &.

Schulz’s memoir is in three chapters: Lost, Found, And. She lists many things we have lost, major and minor. Then she details her father’s death and the ensuing grief.

Found —— what have you found? A soulmate? The second section tells in detail what Schulz found, so detailed but we aren’t allowed to know what C.stands for.

The last section & started so beautifully —- I had to round up my 4.5 rating to 5. Schulz has a beautiful way with words. Many thanks to Netgalley and Random House for introducing me to Schulz.

An emotional memoir that, in fact, wrestles with emotion. Specifically grief but also love and every emotion between and beyond. Kathryn Schulz writes beautifully, drawing from personal experience in grieving her beloved father, and in meeting the love of her life.
Favorite quotes: “Life, too, is a perpetual ‘and’ machine, reliably delivering us a mixture of things to experience all at once.”
“In quick succession, I found one love and lost another, and ever since, both the wonder and the fragility of life have been exceptionally present to me.”
This is a memoir to talk about with friends and loved ones, or maybe just with your journal.

[Thanks to Random House and NetGalley for a chance to read an advanced reader copy of this book.]

Lost and Found: A Memoir (2022) is a thoughtfully written philosophical exploration of loss, mourning, and renewal found in the discovery and celebration of love. Kathryn Schultz author/journalist won a Pulitzer Prize feature magazine writing about the seismic risk located in the Pacific Northwest (2016), Shultz is a staff writer at the New Yorker, this is her second book.

It is an unfortunate cliché that many writers seem to experience unhappy childhoods, Shultz noted that hers was just the opposite. Shultz and her sister were raised by adoring, supportive, and nurturing parents. Due to his own “rootless” (Jewish) childhood status, her father was fluent in six languages, practiced law, and had an extraordinarily brilliant mind, personality, and intellect. Her mother, with a love of language and dictation taught French. Both her parents inspired Shultz foundation of love in learning and education and in the discovery of knowledge, understanding, including a literary awe in the surrounding world.

The process of her parents downsizing, de-junking, and taking up less space (from their spacious multi-storied Ohio home) to an efficiency apartment, began several years before her beloved father’s death at age 74. Through the contemplation of mourning and grief, we can lose our faith, hope, and health. Shultz felt her father’s enduring legacy and reflected on objects lost from keys, clothes, people, places and other things—still, life must continue on without the presence of those we love. Following the death of Prince Albert, Queen Victoria said the “salt” had gone out from her life.

Whether Shultz was writing about meteorites striking and landing on the earth's surface, or what the inland North American coast line was like millions of years ago (with parts of New Jersey, Maryland and Delaware covered by layers of shallow ocean waters), or ancient Egyptian civilizations, to her life hiking along the coastline of Costa Rica, -- readers are presented with interesting psychological, philosophical, or scientific facts and highlights that are interwoven with Shultz life story narrative. By the time Shultz met her wife she simply called “C”—she quickly recognized how right C. was for her. Plato believed that the beloved can be identified through memory that begins to form before birth. While this book can’t be absorbed as quickly as a typical memoir, this book is an impressive and informative read for the seekers of knowledge and truths so often found in life studies. **With thanks to Random House via NetGalley for the DDC for the purpose of review.

To me, this book was a deep analysis of love. Love for your father, love for your partner, and love for others. Divided into three sections, Lost, Found, and And, it explores the impact of love on these life events. There are a lot of literary references throughout the story which makes it both interesting and dry. Her life events were secondary to the literature quoted here. It’s very introspective, I haven’t read anything like it before. Thank you NetGalley for the ARC.

This book dragged on in the first section and seemed to continue saying the same thing. I think possibly it was just the wrong time for me to read this book. I know this story and subject discussion will help many.

The formatting of this book really bogged down the reading. Not having chapters and breaks in the book really slows down the reading. I also felt like it was not a very focused memoir, it was a little all over the place.

Impressive, Informative, and Poignant

SUMMARY
Eighteen months before Kathryn Schulz’s beloved father died of cancer at the age of 74, she met the woman she would marry. In Lost & Found, she weaves the stories of those relationships into an exploration of how all our lives are shaped by both loss and discovery.
Schulz describes her father as a charming, brilliant, absentminded Jewish refugee; and her partner as an equally brilliant farmer’s daughter and devout Christian, both of whom form the foundation for Lost & Found. But it is the and symbol in the middle of her title that made Schultz decide to write this book. She explores how private happiness can coexist with global catastrophe, how we get irritated with those we adore, and how love and loss are unavoidably inseparable. Her book is described as “part memoir, part guidebook to living in a world that is simultaneously full of wonder and joy and wretchedness and suffering—a world that always demands both our gratitude and our grief.”

REVIEW
Schultz adroitly explores how the meaning of “to lose” has expanded over the years. In her analysis, she created a never-ending list of all the things she has lost over her lifetime, like a letter from her grandmother or a threadbare blue plaid shirt. She runs down the “far extremity of what it is possible to lose,” such as our life savings, our job, or the custody of our children. She discovered that some losses are actually positive such as being lost in thought or a book or a conversation.” But for the most part, she says, “our losses lie closer in spirit to the death of my father, in that they diminish our lives.” Our losses she says “encompass both the trivial as well as the consequential, the abstract and the concrete, the merely misplaced and the permanently gone.”

Schultz also keenly explores how finding something can be delightful, rewarding, and even exhilarating. She tells us about a young boy named Billy and how he found a falling star walking across a field one night. Finding, she says, takes one of two forms: recovery of something previously lost; or discovery of something we have never seen before. She observes that sometimes we find things by purposely looking for them, and other times we find things by pure luck, like when she met the love of her life.

Schulz’s engaging stories of her father, her partner, and Billy capture your attention from the beginning. Lost & Found is insightful and evocative. Many of her stories brought back memories of my own mother’s death over 28 years ago. I, too, had experienced a great loss, but the birth of my son nine months earlier was that same counterbalancing Schultz described when she found the woman she would subsequently marry. And much like Schultz, when I first met my husband over 40 years ago, he and I both knew without a doubt, we had found the one we were meant to be with. We both felt as though we had known each other forever, and we were married 90 days later.

I was enthralled by her references to poetry and literature. Her writing is impressive, informative, and poignant. She blended just the right amount of personal stories with thought-provoking analysis. I spent hours reading various parts of the book to my husband. You will want to read this book more than once. I recommend this highly for anyone who has had a significant loss in their life.

KATHRYN SCHULZ is a staff writer at The New Yorker and the author of Being Wrong. She won a National Magazine Award and a Pulitzer Prize for “The Really Big One,” her article about seismic risk in the Pacific Northwest. Lost & Found grew out of “Losing Streak,” a New Yorker story that was anthologized in The Best American Essays. Her work has also appeared in The Best American Science and Nature Writing, The Best American Travel Writing, and The Best American Food Writing. A native of Ohio, she lives with her family on the Eastern Shore of Maryland.

Thanks to Netgalley and Random House for an advance reading copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

“According to data from surveys and insurance companies, each of us misplaces roughly nine objects per day-which means that by the time we turn sixty, we will have lost nearly two hundred thousand things”. This little factoid shows up in the opening section of Kathryn Schulz’ gorgeous new memoir, #Lost&Found Playing with the word and it’s various meaning is just a beginning though, as the book is really a meditation on the loss of her father and in the same year the ‘finding’ of the love of her life, the books second section, Found.

It is here she says, “What an astonishing thing it is to find someone. Loss may alter our sense of scale, reminding us the world is overwhelmingly large while we are incredibly tiny. But finding does the same; the only difference is that it makes us marvel rather than despair.”Grief memoirs can be cathartic or triggering depending on where you are in the process. I personally found this to be much more the former. Yes I was literally weeping at moments, but there is something so profound to me in the recognition of this hallowing space, especially when it’s rendered into such a beautiful and heartfelt tribute, and her father sounded like an exceptionally unforgettable man.

All of this is colored of course by the second halves exquisite shade of love. Shultz takes us through this tender courtship and marriage finding the beauty in the everyday which leads to the books final and logical conclusion the &, and how these two opposing weights can balance the scale of life. “The first problem that loves presents us with is how to find it. But the most enduring problem of love, which is also the most enduring problem of life, is how to live with the fact that we will lose it.” What a special book. I’m so glad to have ‘found’ this. Thanks to @randomhouse and @netgalley for the advance copy.

Kathryn Schultz’s memoir, “Lost & Found”, is a profound and beautiful meditation on love and loss. The three parts of the volume revolve around the grief of losing her beloved father, falling in love with a woman so suited to her, and the interconnectedness of these two human experiences.

She writes: “Life, too, goes by contraries: it is by turns crushing and restorative, busy and boring, awful and absurd and comic and uplifting. We can’t get away from this constant amalgamation of feeling, can’t strain out the ostensible impurities in pursuit of some imaginary essence, and we shouldn’t want to if we could. The world in all its complexity calls on us to respond in kind, so that to be conflicted is not to be adulterated; it is to be complete.”

“What an astonishing thing to find someone. Loss may alter our sense of scale, reminding us that the world is overwhelmingly large while we are incredibly tiny. But finding does the same; the only difference is that it makes us marvel rather than despair.”

This is a book I want to share with all my friends.

"That is all we have, this moment with the world."

When I got the notification from NetGalley saying that 'this publisher has granted your wish', I didn't realize exactly how accurate that statement would be. Lost & Found was truly a gift, and one I wasn't aware I needed.

Chock-full of canny observations on the human condition, philosophical reflections on the nature of love and loss, and quotable pearls of wisdom, it felt like staring up at a night sky (perhaps where the cover inspiration came from) and spiraling deep into your own thoughts. I absolutely loved the balance of personal and educational anecdotes, and I often found myself putting my e-reader down to share a particularly interesting tidbit or quote with my partner. At times both melancholy and joyful, this text was dense without feeling long-winded. Each point, regardless of how arbitrary it might have seemed at the time, was woven into the larger narrative with a deft hand.

I have already been recommending Lost & Found hand over fist, but I have a hunch that this will be one of my favorite non-fiction of the year. Happy Pub Day!

Very much a must read. A fascinating look into the life of a phenomenal author. Her voice flows seamlessly and her view on her world is profound and beautiful. This was amazing from beginning to end. Happy reading!

Honestly speaking I dragged myself through this book. It took me over a week....

The purpose of this book which made me pick it up, although met took too excruciatingly long. I'd have preferred if it was a mix of the authors father biography and the authors memoir but the author tended to go on so many tangents in between.

The book wasn't organised properly, it felt unedited because it was so repetitive. It's like when you tell your teacher you understood but then they go on explaining a 3rd or 4th way that somehow turns your understanding into confusion.

The story of the father was really heartbreaking. It was relatable too. What I didnt appreciate is how the author said "he wondered if he were in Germany, Israel or–" in relation to his dementia. He father had only known the place as Palestine, as it was mentioned his parents left when the un was "carving a whole new country out of it" so he did not know is as Israel at all. I hated that. The author often used tel aviv too mentioning that it was still part of Palestine back then. It was very possible to use its original name and then mention how its forcibly known as tel aviv now, which is the truth but ig we can't have everything we want. Also quoting c.s. Lewis..... really?

The things I liked:
The parallel between love and lose.
The snippets of isaacs life.
The snippets of isaacs sayings.
The discussion of immigration in relation to lose.
The way the author showed their family dynamics.

What a beautifully written and profound memoir. This book must be read slowly as there are so many thought-provoking nuggets of wisdom that captures very visceral emotions and brings them to the surface in the most wonderful way. It is divided into three parts: loss (death, grief, etc.), finding (love), and "and" - everything else in between that allows for the coming together of losing what we find and finding what we lost. My favourite section of all was the one on loss as Schulz dissects grief most divinely. The best book on grief I have ever read. It's just so hard to explain how extraordinary this book is. I highly recommend it!

This ARC was kindly provided by NetGalley and Random House Publishing in exchange for an honest review.

Lyrical beautiful writing the author shares the sadness heartbreak of her fathers death she brings him his life and personality alive through her words.Then she shares the wonder of her finding love her life partner.The emotional moving writing had me pausing rereading certain passages.Will be gifting this to friends.#netgalley #randomhouse

Breathtaking. This is a book that will resonate with every single person who reads it. We have all had losses and we have all found things that have added to the beauty of our lives - in both large and small, meaningful ways . Ms Schultz won the Pulitzer for her writing in 2016. She can write in a way that is relatable and revelatory at the same time - a true gift. I loved this book. I read the last section and then reread it - it’s THAT beautiful. Gorgeous. Read it and share with the people in your life and discuss. Highly recommended!

Kathryn Schulz is a Pulitzer prize winning New Yorker journalist, so when I received an advanced copy of Lost & Found, I was thrilled to read it. There are so many options for books on grief and in recent years, we have seen some really incredible books about losing a loved one. However, I am always drawn to the ones written about the loss of a parent because it is such a challenging process to get through. My dad died 4.5 years ago and it still remains a really complicated piece of my life. At times, it stays nicely packed into a box, but there are moments where it spills over in unexpected ways and I find that I lack the words to fully explain how I feel. Which is where books like Lost & Found come in so nicely because they put words to my feelings.

Schulz perfectly captures the intensely emotional time that comes right after losing someone - in this case, her father. However, she counters this with the story of falling in love with the woman that would become her wife who she met 18 months before her fathers death. The combination of losing someone while finding another is incredibly compelling. She writes with incredible grace and it's very absorbing.

All that said, Schulz sometimes crosses into the esoteric with her references. Both her parents are professors and she is an incredibly gifted writer, but is slightly pretentious tone (though likely unintentional) that comes through because of her references. For example, there is an entire section devoted to how "and" used to be part of the alphabet that then turned into the ampersand. Is this interesting? Yes. Is it relevant to her story? Maybe. For some, it may result in a book that is not terribly accessible.

Nonetheless, if you can move past these sections, Lost & Found is well worth the read. It reminds us that our loved ones remain with us while we move forward with our lives. Grief is not a unilateral process, but one that ebbs and flows. Books like this provide us with an outlet for all of these moments while we are working through the pain.

Thank you to RandomHouse and NetGalley for early access in return for my honest review.

I've already purchased a copy of this book for my mom for her birthday (which is the release date!). While I did really enjoy it, omg, it needs chapter breaks. Having the entire book made up of just 3 "Sections" is overwhelming.

I received this an ARC through Netgalley. I was intrigued to read about a daughter's relationship with her father as I am very close to my own father. However, I felt like this book was all over the place. I was expecting more of a linear story, instead what is presented is the life of her father and herself all over the places with different connections to other things that just didn't flow for me at all.

Kathryn Schulz writes of two of the strongest human emotions; grief at the loss of a loved one, and joy at the discovery of someone to love and share your life with.

The author's father was an incredibly interesting, vibrid man who naturally drew others to him; I wouldn't mind reading his whole story someday.

The love throughout this book is very clear. I have not read Ms. Schultz's writings before, and I can easily see why she is a prize-winning author. Her writing is filled with passages that resonate with me deeply. I would read and then reread them, marvelling at her skill.

In the next moment, she'd seem to be off on a philosphical tangent, which I found distracting. It is almost as if she couldn't bear to keep the reader so close, so near to her raw emotions for too long, so she would toss us out and away, until feeling comfortable enough to be vulnerable again. This drawing the reader in, and pushing us away for a breather continued through the book.

Her ability to capture the essence of intense feelings makes it a worthwhile read.

My thanks to Random House who allowed me to read an ARC of this book (scheduled to be published on 1/11/22) via NetGalley. All opinions expressed in this review are my own and are freely given.

A lingering story of loss, discovery, and finding love. This memoir examines the author's own experience of losing her Dad and how she's processes events leading up to his death. It also examines her experience finding her romantic partner, so weaves in and out of different emotional expressions, explanations, and recollections. Unevenly paced and overall a sad and difficult read in places