What if you were once the one who was lost… and now it’s your job to bring others home?
Jennifer Lynn Barnes, the brilliant mind behind The Inheritance Games, returns with a tense, emotional, and utterly unputdownable thriller in The Lovely and the Lost. It’s got found family, feral pasts, elite search-and-rescue dogs, and secrets buried deep in the wild—and once you start reading, you’ll be racing through the trees right alongside Kira Bennett.
🌲 The Story: A Girl Found in the Wild Must Now Save Another
Kira Bennett doesn’t remember much about her early years—just that she was alone in the woods, wild, surviving. The only thing she does remember clearly? The moment Cady Bennett and her search-and-rescue dog found her and brought her out of the wilderness and into a new life.
Now, years later, Kira is part of the Bennett family—training dogs with her adopted brother Jude and their friend Free, preparing to one day help save others. When Cady’s estranged father asks for help locating a missing girl in the Sierra Glades National Park, the trio is unexpectedly thrust into the center of a dangerous mystery.
But as the search unfolds across 750,000 acres of forest, Kira’s instincts begin to take over—and so do the fractured pieces of her own forgotten past. What begins as a search for one girl spirals into something far more dangerous.
And Kira must ask herself: What if the things she’s been running from her whole life… are finally catching up?
🐕 Why You’ll Love It
✔ A strong, unique heroine with a primal past
✔ Found family dynamics that tug at your heart
✔ Fast-paced mystery and survival thriller vibes
✔ Search-and-rescue dogs (yes, they are STARS)
✔ Twists, secrets, and a wild setting that feels alive
💭 Final Thoughts
The Lovely and the Lost is a masterclass in combining emotional depth with white-knuckle suspense. Kira is a protagonist you won’t forget—fierce, complicated, and navigating trauma with a quiet strength.
This is The Body in the Woods meets The Grace Year, with a heart all its own.
⭐️ 5/5 – Atmospheric, emotionally charged, and completely gripping.
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