Lost to Dune Road by Kara Thomas is another fantastic thriller that had me glued to the pages.
What can I say, Kara Thomas has done it again. I love her books, and this one is no exception. She has a way of spinning a tale that keeps you on the edge of your seat and leaves you wanting more.
What a wonderfully paced thriller, both creepy and intriguing that will have you flipping those pages quickly.

Thank You NetGalley and Thomas & Mercer for your generosity and gifting me a copy of this amazing eARC!

The beautiful cover drew me towards this read but I cannot, for the life of me, get into this book. There are way too many characters that it’s making my mind swim with uncertainty and I was struggling to move forward. Every time I pick up this book, I feel like I need to pay extra special attention to the storyline because the two cases being investigated are quite similar, but I’m having a hard time differentiating the two.

It’s taken me a week to read a little over half and I’m not enjoying it. I understand that a good book would need a little romance splashed inside, but this one felt child-like. After about 70%, I skimmed to the end, but I wasn’t wow-ed with the conclusion.

Thanks to NetGalley and Thomas & Mercer for this read. It was an okay read for me. It was just jam packed with characters it was way too much. I did not enjoy it as much because of that. Sometimes you forget how this person relates to the story and they come out of nowhere. It was okay.

I live for a redemption story and one that has a new thrill added to the mix.
This was atmospheric and dark and entertaining and OH WOW SO GOOD!

I loved this and didn't want it to end!

This was my first novel by Kara Thomas and I was definitely impressed! This was a twisty suspenseful novel and I couldn’t get enough!

Lee’s determination to get justice for these two young women was just amazing. She never gave up even when everyone wanted her to. She followed her gut even when it might get her in trouble. I loved that she cared so much about what happened to the women.

I definitely plan to read more of Kara Thomas.

Lee was once a journalist, but became disgraced when a murder suspect she named ended his life. She has been trying to forget the Jenna Mackey case and working as a PI since then. When the mother of Amanda, a girl found pregnant and on the verge of death, finds Lee's contact info in Amanda's bag, she reaches out for help solving what happened to her. But the more Lee digs in, the more connections she finds between Amanda and Jenna.

This is my third book from this author and she is an instant pre-order for me. That said, this book was a lot slower of a start than I am used to seeing from her. Some parts of the book felt a bit random and convoluted, but overall I enjoyed the story and kept reading to find out who the killer was.

Thank you NetGalley for an arc of this book in exchange for my honest review.

This was a good read! Loved the theme, and the way it was written. A slow burn that wasn't boring or lost momentum in the middle. I hope there's more mysteries with this journalist that's spunky, smart and capable.

Thank you to MBC PR for my review copy. all opinions are my own.

3 stars.Lost to Dune Road is a dark and suspenseful thriller that does discuss some tough topics. The overall premise is a good one and immediately grabbed my attention however it was easy to get lost in the multitude of characters, the pacing and two different situations they were flipping back and forth for. The tough subjects discussed in this book include: police (and politician) corruption, abortion and adoption, and unhealthy relationships (particularly where older men and young girls are concerned). I was able to get into the book/plot over halfway through and actually really liked how both major storylines were woven together, however at times I was confused about which victim I was reading about and the details of their story. There were some suspenseful parts but there were also some parts that tended to drag on for awhile. My major issue was with the sheer number of characters involved in this book. I understand there are 2 major plot lines going on within however it was hard to sometimes follow along.

If you like private investigator/detective based thrillers I think you may enjoy this one. It wasn't one of my favorites however I would pick up another book by her!.

Thank you Netgalley & Thomas & Mercer for the opportunity to read this novel. These thoughts and opinions are my own.

“‘Everyone wants to be on the winning team in the end.’ ‘Or maybe even shitty people are capable of doing the right thing sometimes.’”

I love how the author used the real life issue,
in the local to her Gilgo Case, of the mistreatment of families by authorities when a missing woman has a history of sex work. As if that diminishes the importance of them being found. Ugh!

In Lost To Dune Road a desperate mother asks disgraced reporter Lee Ellerin, now a private investigator, to investigate the mysterious suicide attempt of her pregnant college student daughter. She wants answers and she knows her daughter Amanda would never do this. Yet no one is taking her seriously. Can Lee help?

This is a multifaceted and multilayered story of money, police corruption, the power of the media, and murder. There are A LOT of characters here and I may have given this book five stars if I was able to keep them all straight. But overall this book hooked me from the start and had me flipping those pages looking for answers.

Thank you to @karathomaswrites, @amazonpublishing, and @mbc_books for the #gifted copy.

REVIEW as posted to my IG account 4/13

Review copies courtesy of MBC and Thomas & Mercer. Thank you #partner #gifted.

Lost to Dune Road
Kara Thomas
4/16

📖 For a disgraced reporter-turned-PI, unraveling a conspiracy of murder could mean redemption.

💭 This has everything I love in a mystery/thriller... The writing is excellent - the epitome of show, not tell. It's intelligent, plot-forward, perfectly paced, with no unnecessary details to bog it down. It pulled me in immediately, and kept me coming back for more.

Lost to Dune Road is a suspenseful, edge-of-your-seat, investigative thriller and easily one of the best I've read so far this year! I'm immediately adding Thomas's backlist to my TBR!

⚠️ This does get a bit dark and touches on SA and other difficult themes.

📌 Available 4/16, and will be available on Kindle Unlimited in both ebook and audiobook.

Exactly what you'd expect. Typical PI/Detective setup where they just run around interviewing people and trying to piece the crime together. Would have preferred the entire novel to be told from the victim's perspective rather than the PI. The victim chapters were well crafted and compelling. The PI chapters, not so much. Our PI, Lee, was that rough around the edges, beer drinking, taco bell eating (but still pretty!) character. Nothing new there. Her chapters were confusing due to too many characters, and annoying due to an unnecessary love interest.

This was perfectly readable and inoffensive. I'd just personally rather read something unique that I hate, than read something this generic.

I love a good murder mystery with a strong female lead, and this one did not disappoint! This featured a female private detective and the story was full of twists. It was fun to read and I was invested from the beginning. The conclusion was shocking and I never saw it coming!

Lee Ellerin is a former reporter whose investigation into the murder of a young girl caused her to lose everything including her own job as a reporter. Five years later, Lee is working as a private investigator, when she was asked to investigate the nearly attempted murder of pregnant Amanda who is left in coma. As Lee is investigating, she finds a connection between Amanda and the previous girl that Lee was investigating on--Amanda like the previous victim was seen on Dune Road. Is there a connection between the two victims? Why was Amanda at the Dune Road?

This was actually a fast-paced thriller, packed with twists and turns and is also a page turner. I also like the plot of the story as I found the plot to be interesting. The writing was also great and I feel that the author did a good job of making the reader draw into the story. Despite the good things, I felt there were too many characters in the book which actually made the book a bit confusing as to who is who. The romance part of this thriller I feel is unnecessary. Most of the characters in the book are unlikable which is also another bad thing. The story shifts between Lee, who is the main protagonist and Amanda the second known victim, which outlined how she got pregnant and got ended up in the situation. This is also more like a political thriller in my opinion as well--well known men, elite people from Hamptons, money, power...that was the main outline of the story.

But overall, I did enjoy the book despite these things and I am actually looking forward to read more books from this author. Worth 4 stars.

Many thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC. The review is based on my honest opinion only.

This was another really good thriller by Kara Thomas! While she's not my favorite thriller writer, I always know I'm going to read a solid story by her. And Lost to Dune Road was no exception. From the get-go, this story grabbed my attention and honestly never let go. It moves at a fast pace, and there was a small dual-POV. The ending was a tiny lackluster, but overall, it was really well done and tied everything together. I thought the side characters were done really well too.

Thank you so much to netgalley and Thomas & Mercer for the arc of this book in exchange for an honest review!

Unfortunately, this book was a DNF for me. The writing just felt so dense and hard for me to connect with. There were a lot of characters and I just couldn’t keep up. I kept getting lost.

This one didn’t work for me but I hope others love it.

Lee, once a reporter for Vanity Fair, lost her job by pointing fingers at a rich man. She's now a private investigator, and the job she recently has been hired for seems to link to a crime that happened that caused her to lose her job.

The plot of this story was very interesting to me, but the way it played out was hard to keep straight. There were so many characters and having 2 crimes intertwined was hard to keep separate. There was also a questionable past romance that didn't seem to fit the storyline and made it feel messy.

I did enjoy the 2 POVS. One was by Lee in the present and the other was by Amanda, which describes how the crime came to be.

Thank you to Netgalley, Kara Thomas, and the publishers for this free ebook. This review is 100% my own and honest opinion.

Can Kara Thomas ever write a bad book?? Idk because I've loved everything I've read of hers.

This is wayyyy high up there with Dark Corners for my favorite book by Kara although I feel like Dark Corners was just so special to me that I have to choose that one.

This takes on such a classic detective thriller outline but with Kara's obvious style. The true crime aspect was well done. The characters were very well thought out and the mystery, while being predictable later on, was engrossing and very interesting.

I cannot wait to read more and I hope she continues on in this style and voice.

Thank you to the publisher for an advanced copy!

Five years ago, Lee’s career in journalism ended after she made a mistake in not properly vetting a source, while writing about a missing woman. Today, she works as a private investigator, and tries to keep out of the spotlight. That changes when she is approached by the mother of a pregnant college student, whose daughter is in a coma. The comatose woman had Lee’s name on a piece of paper in her wallet, and her mother wants Lee to look into the circumstances behind what happened to her daughter. As Lee begins investigating, she discovers there may be a connection to the case that ended her journalism career.

I really enjoyed this book. It was very fast paced and full of action, and I never got bored. Lee is an easy character to root for, and I loved following her investigation. This book was full of twist and turns, and kept me guessing until the end. The final twist came out of nowhere and made my job drop. I definitely recommend this book.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for a free e-arc in exchange for an honest review.

Lost to Dune Road by Kara Thomas is a crime thriller novel with a private detective at the lead. The story in Lost to Dune Road is one that is told mainly from the point of view of the main characters but does occasionally switch to another point of view with some flashing back to previous events.

Lee Ellerin had once been in her dream career of being a investagative reporter when things came crashing down for Lee. Working on a case that had gained national attention of a young woman’s unsolved murder Lee made a huge mistake and it cost her her journalism career.

Now five years later Lee has become a private investigator when she is contacted by the mother of yet another victim. Amanda Hartley is pregnant and in a coma after what was initially thought to be a suicide but Lee’s name was found in Amanda’s things even though Lee doesn’t seem to know her and with that connection Lee can’t help but dive into this new case as memories of the old haunt her.

Lost to Dune Road is not the first book I’ve read by author Kara Thomas so I went in expecting to absolutely love this one. Unfortunately that wasn’t so much the case with finishing at three and a half stars but it was still a solid story. I think for me this one was a case of just a little too much being added into the mix that I felt like it was kind of convoluted without really needing to be with a lot of characters tossed into the mix. The story was dark and one that drew me in and perhaps with a little less involved it would have been a total hit.

I received an advance copy from the publisher via NetGalley.

This was my first book by Kara Thomas, but I have a few of her others on my TBR! Lee is a reporter turned private investigator working to solve the mysterious connection between two crimes that happened on Dune Road. I really liked Lee and found myself invested in her getting answers — especially after what happened to her with the first Dune Road crime. I kept trying to solve the mystery, but Thomas kept me guessing and the ending was satisfying!

LOST TO DUNE ROAD is a slow-burn thriller filled with suspense and tension.