By: Cynthia Ayala

Millie Bird is seven years old and abandoned by her mother, but that doesn’t stop her from being hopeful. Agantha Pantha, eighty-two, has not left her house since the death of her husband and fills her days by telling at anything and everything. Karl the Touch Typist, eighty-seven, who has escaped the nursing home to live the free life he enjoys, typing words as he speaks. Together these three have been thrown together in the hopes of returning Millie to her mother in Kalgoorlie and the three of them discover more about life than they ever have before.

Lost and Found is a contemporary novel by debut author Brooke Davis. Published on June 24, 2014 by Hachette, the novel focuses on three very different characters who go on an adventure together where who they are changes drastically helping them all live a little happier and wiser.

This novel is an emotional journey, not only for the characters but also for the reader as it goes forth to tie together three very different characters, each of which is lost internally to sadness and loss. These characters – Milly, Agatha and Karl – go on a journey to reunite Millie with her struggling mother who abandoned her in a department store. But the journey, filled with bumps in the road and interactions that allow these characters to grow develop and find themselves while they learn that sadness is okay and that living is the best cure in the world for any sort of sadness.

Shifting between character point of view’s, Davis keeps the story moving forward to not only develop the story but to develop the characters as well. The story starts off with Millie, an inquisitive young girl whose father has passed away leaving her mother to take care of her, which results in her just living alone. Throughout the journey, Millie finds herself and allows herself to feel the sadness of being abandoned while. This forces her to grow up a little quicker but also makes her a little wiser, helping Agatha and Karl see that old age doesn’t mean death and that death is just another rite of passage and is nothing to be frightened of.

As for Agatha, in her life she was always so cold and forces herself to live her life alone for the guilt she feels at never telling her husband who passed away that she loved him. Her journey is the most thought provoking because it tells a deeper story of a woman who has lived a very long life. In her actions, in the way she lives, readers can see that she is punishing herself and the moment she stops, the moment she decides to live in the present instead of the past her evolution is extraordinary.

Then there is Karl the touch typist to continues to mourn the passing of his wife. But what holds him back isn’t that but rather his own disappointment in himself and who he has turned out to be. This adventure allows him to spread his wing and act like a teenager who drinks beer and wants to party. Karl’s story is the lightest of the trio, balancing out the stories and the humor within them.

Each story and the way they intermingle captivates the reader and creates this emotional drive that makes the reader want to continue reading to find out how everything is going to turn out.

Davis’s writing technique is also quite ingenious. There is no quotation usage to distinguish who is talking and when, but rather molds into the text. While this makes it difficult at times to distinguish who is talking and when, the way it molds benefits the story as a whole because it forces the reader, however subconsciously, to read between the lines and to read the emotions of the character, allowing the characters emotions to imprint onto the reader.

Lost and Found is an incredible novel that will grab the readers on an emotional level. (★★★★ ½ out of 5 ☆‘s | A-)