Book Review: The Book of Lost Friends - Highly Recommend

Back in the day, before cell phones, I spent a stressful, terrifying few hours with no idea where my husband was or what had happened to him. It was gut-wrenching and distressing. Here's my best recollection of the events of that day: On a snowy winter morning, we took the highway, headed for a marital counseling session. As I drove, a neighboring driver began gesticulating wildly, attempting to get us to pull over. We had no idea who this was. I took our expected exit and kept driving (the guy following) until I pulled up behind a police car on the side of a road. The guy claimed a piece of ice from the top of our vehicle struck and cracked his windshield. The officer directed us to take the matter to a court building very near our counseling site. Why didn't we insist on staying together? John told me to drop him off and go to the session, then return for him afterwards. I spent the next hour "on the couch," so to speak, and returned to the court building but found no trace of my husband. I think I asked around and a person saw him get into a vehicle with another man.

After endless waiting, I was unsure what to do. How helpless you feel when you've no idea where your loved one has vanished to, if you will ever find them again, or if they have come to some sort of brutal end. Because I was younger then, I don't think my mind played out all the worst-case scenarios as it would now, but I was beyond distressed. After several hours, a cab pulled up and my husband stepped out.

The relief was palpable. During the drive home, he explained. Someone at the court building said they had to file an accident report at the highway's toll booth. The man with the cracked windshield, eager to get his desired resolution, took John there, but then claimed he had to get to work and could not drive John back to the court building. Someone in the toll booth allowed my husband to use the phone, and he attempted to call to leave a message for me with his location. The counseling center, bound by confidentiality laws, refused to pass any message on to me. The next dilemma? He had insufficient funds to hire a cab to take him back to the court building. He called one anyhow and a kind-hearted cabbie provided the fare for free. In the end, they labelled the shattered windshield as "a road hazard," so the whole episode had been a pointless venture into terror and grief.

Thus, I could relate to The Book of Lost Friends. Although I didn't face the intensity the slaves experienced, I walked a mile in their shoes. This book is based upon factual accounts taken from advertisements in a Southern paper, where slaves sought information about lost family members ripped away from them. Lisa Wingate does a marvelous job of weaving two time periods into a cohesive and impactful tale. In one story line, it is 1875 and the slave Hannie Gossett follows her owner Lavinia (with Juneau Jane, Lavinia's half-sister from the father's second side-family) on a quest to find information about the missing plantation owner. Each girl has a unique story to share as they grow together on their journey. When they happen upon the pages of the book of lost friends, Hannie determines to find her people.

In the second story line, it is 1987 and Bennie Silva begins a new teaching career in a dilapidated community in Louisiana, on the heels of a failed engagement. She is unsure she has what it takes to nurture a vision for a better tomorrow in the hearts and minds of her young students. Finally, a history project about the local Goswood plantation lights a fire in both teacher and her students. Of course, there are those who do not want the truths of the past revealed. Can Bennie push through this obstacle? Will the book they find in the plantation house bring lives together? Might she have a future with Nathan Gossett? Or will the same mysterious piece in her past that foiled her engagement hinder her new love interest?

Once again, I'm so glad I took a gamble on a longer audio book. The narration was outstanding, and the story was important. This book brings to life so many historical truths and dreadful realities of our American past. Each character, and unique story, will move you. I highly recommend this Lisa Wingate book. It will wrench your heart out, but piece it back together again. It didn't stop with the pain, but brought that painful past into a present resolution and redemption. This is historical fiction at its finest!