The Book of Lost Friends
An unforgettable and emotional historical epic about love, loss and family
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4.8 • 5 Ratings
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- £2.99
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- £2.99
Publisher Description
THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
'A tale of enduring power' Paula McLain
From the author of the No.1, two million-copy bestseller Before We Were Yours comes a dramatic story of a family separated, their search for answers, and an epic journey to reunite the missing . . .
Louisiana, 1875: In the tumultuous aftermath of Reconstruction, three young women set off as unwilling companions on a perilous quest. For heiresses Lavinia and Juneau Jane, the journey is one of inheritance and financial desperation, but for Hannie, torn from her mother and siblings before slavery's end, the pilgrimage westward reignites an agonizing question. Could her long-lost family still be out there?
Louisiana, 1987: Arriving in Augustine, Louisiana, first-year teacher Benedetta Silva finds herself teaching students whose poverty-stricken lives she can scarcely comprehend. The town is impossibly set in its ways, suspicious of new ideas and new people. But amid the gnarled live oaks and ancient plantation homes lies the century-old history of three young women, a long-ago journey, and a hidden book that could change everything.
A heart-wrenching novel inspired by little-known historical events, based on actual "Lost Friends" advertisements that appeared in Southern newspapers after the Civil War, as freed slaves desperately searched for loved ones, lost to them when their families were sold off.
'Tragic, thought-provoking but ultimately uplifting . . . an enthralling adventure' Lancashire Evening Post
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this disappointing outing, Wingate (Before We Were Yours) explores the history of a small Louisiana town where a new teacher's attempt to connect with her students leads her to learn about the difficult lives of three women. After the Civil War, freed slave Hannie Gossett works at Goswood Grove as a sharecropper and spends years hoping her mother, who was sold during the war, will return. In 1875, Hannie, in hopes of finding her family, follows the daughters of the man who once owned her to Texas, where he disappeared. In 1987, Benny Silva arrives in Augustine, La., to teach at a high school with an apathetic student body. As a ploy to capture their imaginations, she researches Goswood Grove and finds records about Hannie's journey to Texas. Though the twists of Hannie's and Benny's stories will keep readers guessing, the book is marred by a lack of depth, and Hannie's reliance on and trust in her former owner is frustratingly unquestioned. Benny, meanwhile, who likens her own experiences as an Italian-American to those of her impoverished students of color, comes off as naive. This underwhelming tale is sunk by its surfeit of deficiencies.
