What is Found, What is Lost: A Novel

by Anne Leigh Parrish

Freddie was raised on faith. It’s in her blood. Yet when she loses her husband of many years, she can’t quite bring herself to seek solace from the Almighty, and enters a state of quiet contemplation, instead. Her solitude quickly ends when she meets a man roaming her neighborhood in search of his run-away wife, and later, when her daughter returns home to escape another unwise romance. Soon after, Freddie’s sister, Holly, visits and their thoughts turn to their wretched childhood at the hands of their neglectful and pious mother. Also present is their grandmother, Anna, known only through photographs and letters, who seems so different – strong, yet remote. Freddie feels she and Anna are connected, not just through blood, but through the raising of difficult daughters. This kinship makes Freddie see that she has been shaped by forces she doesn’t directly experience, which reminds her about the true basis of faith. With all that to hand, Freddie faces a family crisis that forces her to confront the same questions she’s asked all her life: What does it mean to believe in God? And does God even care? 

180 pages, Paperback

Published October 15, 2014

About the author

Award-winning writer Anne Leigh Parrish's second poetry collection, IF THE SKY WON'T HAVE ME, will arrive in April from Unsolicited Press. Her latest novel, AN OPEN DOOR, was published in October 2022, also from Unsolicited Press. Recent titles are A WINTER NIGHT, a novel, March 2021 and THE MOON WON'T BE DARED, a poetry collection, October 2021. She is the author of eight other books, most notably MAGGIE'S RUSE, and THE AMENDMENT, both novels. She has recently ventured into the art of photography and displays her work at www.laviniastudios.com. She lives among the evergreen trees in the South Sound region of Washington State. Find her online at her website, Twitter, Facebook, Medium, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Goodreads.

Reviews

[Joe · Rating 5 out of 5]

Anne Leigh Parrish is everything right about literary fiction. She excels at her craft, seamlessly weaving nonlinear tales across generations, effortless infusing ruminations on faith, religion, love and infidelity, displaying a mastery of language. She offers such evocative, passionate prose. Though she leaves the stage for long stretches, Freddie is the star of this show; What Is Lost is her story. When we meet Freddie, she is middle aged, frumpy, “body … thick, and her hair . . . what some would call salt and pepper.” She is the dowdy type of woman you pass fifteen times a day in a grocery store and don’t think about twice. But as the narrative jumps around, and we are taken behind the scenes to understand how she became the woman she did, we marvel at her greatest accomplishment: simply surviving. Freddie used to be Faith, her sister Holly, Hope, their mother, Lorraine, a Jesus-thumping alcoholic, whose misguided incompetence is what they’ve spent their lives trying to escape. To understand fully how we get here, Part Two takes us all the way back to grandparents Olaf and Anna. This is a risky strategy, essentially introducing an entire new cast of characters after we’ve just become invested in the current one. But it works. The best part of Parrish’s work is that, in all the broken dreams and woe, she manages to elicit a glimmer of home. Whether that’s Beth’s returning home and a blossoming romance, or Holly’s finally finding the resolve her big sister has. My personal favorite example is found in Freddie and Ken’s relationship. While he was alive, Ken was a man with limited understanding, a red-ass cop quick with the put-down, slow to forgive. But in death, Freddie recreates Ken. Instead of glomming onto the worst parts of her dead husband, she forges a healthy (if talking to a ghost can ever be considered “healthy”) relationship. And in death they find the calm and ease denied them in life. It’s a nifty trick pulled by Parrish that adds another layer to what is a remarkable and moving novel.

[Lawrence Parlier · Rating 5 out of 5]

In What is Found, What is Lost, Anne Leigh Parrish has crafted an elegant and powerful novel that explores the intricacies of family and faith.
It is a heart wrenching tale of four generations of women forged, in part, by their relationship to faith and how each’s connection to their beliefs affects the succeeding generation. The main characters are strong pragmatic women vividly drawn. The story of their relationships and quiet tragedies lingers long after the last page is turned.
Ms. Parrish’s vibrant prose guides the reader through the story with a deft hand. No mean feat in a story set in so many places across so many years. She handles the challenge brilliantly and in its languid execution has lessons to teach.
Simply put, What is Found, What is Lost is a novel on par with the best in American letters. As a debut, it is a tour de force that demands serious attention.
Pick it up. You will not be disappointed.

[Norelle Done · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have never read anything quite like "What is Found, What is Lost" before, and it was so wonderful to read something unique. I was captivated by the lives of Freddie, her grandmother Anna, and her mother Lorraine.

Anne Leigh Parrish writes in a way that is both interesting and fluid - it's easy to get drawn in and picture everything that is happening with each chapter - whether Freddie is rinsing out a glass of water or Anna is scolding her servant. I felt like I was right there inside the story in a lot of cases. There were a couple of transitions in the storyline that kind of felt 'jolty' - the one that stands out is *spoiler alert* when Anna runs away with Olaf. I felt like there should have been a little more story to give more reason to that choice.

But overall, the imagination and creativity in the stories of these four women was wonderful. They act in a way that usually makes sense, even if I would never consider making the same decision. I was frustrated by Freddie at times, because I felt like she held onto the trials of her life a bit too much, but I could still put myself in her shoes. Anna's story was fascinating to me (I am a historical fiction nut, so that could be why), and although her experience was quite foreign to me, I understood where she was coming from for the most part. I couldn't stand Lorraine, but I was able to see a way to justify some of her actions. Beth was more of a mystery to me, because her story was so opposite my own, but I could relate to a lot of her thoughts and some of her feelings.

I would have liked to get more of a look into Beth's, life. I felt like I didn't quite have enough to really understand her and where she was coming from with some of her decisions and interests at the end of the book.

Overall, I highly recommend "What is Found, What is Lost" if you are looking for an engaging read that deals with plenty of variety in characters and their perspectives on religion and relationships. This one really resonates and I think Anne Leigh Parrish did an excellent job!

[Bonnie ZoBell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Parrish's exceptional prose in this debut novel creates sympathetic portraits of two sisters whose over-the-top evangelical mother has taken off to follow a revival minister on the road. . on in older age as they still struggle with trying to fit in with mainstream America and still have to deal with their mother, who aside from being an obsessive evangelist is an alcoholic. Now, as the older sister has become a widow, with Parrish's masterful characterization, we see how the sisters are still trying to fit into mainstream society.

[Anesa · Rating 5 out of 5]

The latest offering from Anne Leigh Parrish manages to be totally unique while also calling to mind the work of Alice Munro and Flannery O'Connor. Unexpected events unfurl through the lives of four generations of women, bringing love and heartache in their wake. The mystery of human attractions and interactions lead to twists of fate that stymie mothers and daughters as they struggle to understand themselves and their needs. This is a lovely book that I highly recommend to all literary readers.

[Mike Joyce · Rating 5 out of 5]

Anne Leigh Parrish is back, with her latest novel What is Found, What is Lost releasing on She Writes Press. I was very excited when I received a review copy of this book in the mail last month–Parrish’s writing career is something I’ve been following since she first submitted and was published to Literary Orphans Journal two years ago.

updated-novel-coverIf you are familiar with her style and interests, you know that Parrish is an expert at writing about the inner workings of a family. This is good news for me, a die-hard Updike fan. Yet Parrish takes her own spin on it—she covers a family’s rise and fall, triumphs and failures, from a deeply diverse, multiple-character lens. This novel continues on in that fantastic tradition–but focuses on an even deeper analysis, as it covers four different generations of women as they mature and intersect and haunt one another in the American Midwest.

Let me backtrack for a moment and talk about the structure and composition of the novel. The book is gorgeous—it has a matte, good-feeling, almost rubbery cover that will make you think of a night in the early fall an hour after the sun sets and the sky forces you to remember that it is cosmic, overwhelming you in an inky blue. On the cover we see a woman in a white dress, perhaps a wedding dress, with a type of shawl over her head—a lot of foreshadowing there—and she seems to be glowing as she looks up into the sky. This otherworldly white and blue is carried on to the thin title font and the back-cover font, where we see a great 6-pointed orange star (representing Chicago?) heading off the text. The paper is of good stock, and the ink is great quality as well–you’ll notice in the large font of the chapter-headings, the ink is shining just a bit above the height of the page. The book clocks in at about 250 pages.

The mechanical structure of the book is divided into four parts plus a brief epilogue–each chapter, of which there are 41, takes us back and forth between the generations of women and their interactions with one another–no one part is exclusively dedicated to a generation or a time. With this we get a grasp of the ever-present fluidity, the ever present sense of ghost that exists within What is Found, What is Lost. The chapters themselves read at most times like flash, and have a Dybekian quality to them. They hit you hard and fast before you get comfortable, and as you go on to the next chapter, you get another lens shift into a different time and place.

We start off with Freddie, a fresh widow of a cop who died of cancer, in the year 2012. We’re in Sioux Falls, South Dakota and we’re walking a designer dog down the street. Freddie’s mind wanders to her dead husband, and her daughter, Beth, who has been stripping in Nevada to make a living for herself and her young son and to—Freddie is sure–incense her now dead cop father. Immediately we are aware of the main themes, as in this chapter and the next we understand that Freddie is used to being alone, likes it, finds a peculiar freedom and spontaneity in loneliness. As Freddie walks her dog, a strange man in a pickup is chugging down the small streets. All her neighbors are concerned that he is dangerous. Freddie invites him in. That’s when we learn the second thing about Freddie–that she is not afraid of confrontation.

Over the next few chapters we are introduced to our protagonist’s mother, Lorraine, who was a true believer (and a drunk) that raised Freddie and her sister Holly in religious camps and exclusion–devoid of schooling and healthcare. We learn about this true believer’s own mother, Anna, the Armenian who fled Constantinople with her Jewish husband, and through a series of events finds her way to Chicago without that Jewish husband. We will step back and learn more about the man in the pickup truck, Nate, whose wife converted to Islam and left him—Nate, who drives around the streets day after day looking for a woman in a hijab. We’ll learn about the youngest woman–the fourth generation–and her affair with a priest.

Now you are seeing the other main theme of this novel, the struggle with religion–a theme that holds a lot of interest for me personally. We have two discontinuous generations of powerful women who are unbelievers, and we have their daughters who in some way have a type of thermidorian reaction and are pulled into a search for religion and a lust–an actual, sexual, lust–for it. It shows us that religion is not only about believers and atheists, even if it would be simpler that way for me to think so. We learn about the impact of personal belief on those around the person with the belief, the impact on future generations and how they choose to explore this part of themselves (or not). It is about the weight of cultural inheritance. It is also about radical religion as a vehicle–a form of escape, of the sort that Max Weber outlined in his analyses of the American West–a land where 150 years ago without generations of roots and tradition, new ideas and new religions and new cults thrived.

What is Found, What is Lost is about the intersectionality of womanhood throughout four generations, where it is about the impact of religion on those generations–it is also about much more—the small infinities and events that make up a family’s cultural inheritance. It is about the PTSD of the lost World War One generation. It is about struggles of faith in romance as much as in religion. It is about small-town politics and it is about a criminal element and how families will sink to it to make a profit. It is about being the messy savior of a people who oppressed you, and the hollowness of being saved. What is Found, What is Lost, is about sisterhood late in life and dealing with a family-member’s stroke, and it is about divorce and false love. Most looming–to me at least, as a Midwestern writer and reader–it is about the presence of the prairies and the snow and the small-towns and that particular sort of person you find hunkered down in them during the long winters. We get four beautifully chaotic generations of them. And man, do we get it.

Pick this one up. Highly recommended.

[Judy Croome · Rating 3 out of 5]

An unusual, meandering book with odd characters, strange relationships and some thought-provoking moments about the nature of faith and religion. The style was easy and lyrical, but the characters didn't fully engage me, despite the interesting reflection of how an ancestral lineage can be carried through from generation to generation: as they were battered by life and the consequences of their personal choices, a defining character trait of hardness, almost cruelty, was transferred from Anna, to Lorraine, to Freddie & Holly and then onto Beth.

Freddie, perhaps, was the most appealing character, but there was a vagueness about her that left me uncertain whether she had actually transcended her upbringing, or had simply surrendered to it and drifted through life unconsciously damaging Beth, her daughter, as much as she had been damaged by her mother, the unlikable and crazy religious fanatic Lorraine.

This is a book which may gain more clarity and enjoyment with a second reading.

[Lisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a captivating story of four generations of dysfunctional women or as the author puts it, "written by women who fled. Anna left the country of her birth. Lorraine left Anna and Olaf. Beth left Freddie and Ken." Each generation's choice of men helping to create issues for the next generation, but you read on wanting to know if Freddie and Beth can normalize their mother-daughter relationship and will there be a different life for Beth once she's given up exotic dancing or will she return for the attention and power she feels it gives. Thank you Goodreads for this giveaway. I enjoyed it.

[Joanne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very moving book, can imagine this could happen when something such as a cult occurs. What a mature young girl who could take over and help her sister, recommend it for reading

[Melisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

I started this book slightly ambivalent, believing it would focus heavily on religion and its role in the characters' lives. I was gladly relieved to find this was not the case. Religion and faith does have an impact on the women featured in this book, but it isn't at all the central theme. Rather, this book considers faith in all its forms. Religion is definitely a driving theme, but also presented are the effects of faith in family and in oneself.

Freddie is the first person we're introduced to, and as the story progresses, we begin to understand why she seems self-sufficient yet also a pillar of strength through her background and through revelations about the past experiences of her grandmother, the past and present circumstances of her mother and the current struggles of her daughter. The story also involves Freddie's sister and her grandson, and every character struggles with something, whether it be accepting religion or merely understanding their own worth. Each person feels bereft of something. Perhaps that is why I couldn't get too immersed in the story.. I felt bereft too and at times felt so lost looking for what they were trying to find. Maybe that's a point of this story, though, that I was suppose to discover for myself. If so, I've realized too late..

The character I liked learning about most was Beth, Freddie's daughter. She was a wild child, leaving to live what could be deemed a life of sin, eventually adding a child to the mix and returning home and bringing along her more questionable choices. She presents a look at motherhood different than what the other women do. She's not overbearing and fanatical nor does she seem reliant on some omnipotent being to point her in the right path when it comes to child-rearing. She's not necessarily a hands-off parent, but her choices can be viewed as potentially damaging to her child. I wished there had been greater insight into her life.

Lorraine and Anna were also interesting although it took me awhile to figure out their roles and relationship to Freddie, and by the time I was able too, I was already too detached to care. Anna, Freddie's grandmother, pursued a man and lifestyle that may be considered quite unexpected and inappropriate during her time. She was impulsive yet resourceful. Her choices led to a difficult life and some regrettable situations, and perhaps this was another aspect that confused me about this book. I kept expecting some infusion of religion for her, whether to let Anna see the error of her ways or to force her to face some sort of penance, but it never came. Also, her experiences were presented and I couldn't find a connection to how they affected the lives of the newer generations. Anna's daughter, Lorraine, turns to religion devotedly perhaps because the people she meets in that environment give her the attention she is looking for. She's a sort of hypocrite, though, and it's hard to find any redeeming qualities in her.

It took me a while to figure out what was happening in the book. When the story changed perspectives or time periods, it was hard for me to figure out who was speaking about whose experiences and the role the played in the others' lives. The changes in time and place of when events happened confused me at first, and the jumps made it difficult for me to track events. After I realized the main characters were four generation of women from the same family, it started to make more sense, but by then I was already pretty deep into the book and was finding it difficult to hold my interest. I think if I were to re-read this book, I might appreciate it more and find more meaning, and maybe I'll be able to do so in the future.

Please note: I received this book for free through a Goodreads Giveaway. Thank you to everyone who made that possible.

[Mary Latela · Rating 5 out of 5]

REVIEW: What is Found, What is Lost: A Novel by Anne Leigh Parrish SHEWRITESPRESS
Mary E. Latela

What is Found What is Lost: A Novel by Anne Leigh Parrish is a splendid, rich, and deeply thoughtful journey through the lives of the women of one Midwestern family. They seem eerily similar, not particularly interested in being mothers, and treating their children badly, trying to get along with men who are complicated and mostly unresponsive. They either feel too passionately or act the stoic, holding everything inside.

This is not a story about religion or faith. It is not an “inspirational book,” nor a Christian book. This is a multilayered series of stories about women trying to find themselves through their encounters of every sort of distortion, anomaly, seen in “religious people: those who love religion, hate religion, pretend to be people of faith, in other words, hypocrites. As in life, these misfits come in every religious group. The tapestry of this family is sewn, loosely, imperfectly by these outsiders, and therein lies the novel’s captivating charm.

Freddie, the newly widowed central character, ties together the generations. First Lorraine, her abusive, alcoholic mother, shows up, having been sent home by the lecherous tent preacher who’d lured her into running away from home to spread the “Good news” decades before. She’d abandoned her daughters, Freddie and Holly, in the tent community, left them to fend for themselves, nearly illiterate, unkempt, and hungry.

Before Freddie married Ken, a cop, she told him what she knew of her background, and he was not turned off, but resigned, stating, ”I’m a cop. I’ve seen everything.” Apparently, Ken and Freddie argued a great deal, he resenting her working at a grocery store, she determined to show resolve, forbearance, and sometimes, silence. When they had their daughter Beth, Freddie was dutiful, but sometimes cruel and demanding, never affectionate.

Freddie seems to be the one to come home to, so Holly and her husband visit, bursting with plans for a car, a new home, and other material things. The homecoming of the daughter, Beth, nearly unnerves Freddie. Beth ran away as a teen, worked in a questionable place, and has a son, whom she virtually ignores. She announces that she is pregnant; the father is a married priest.

Parrish’s linguistic expertise is compelling. When Anna, the grandmother, needs to find a place where she is not known, she boards a streetcar and notes: “All those people with their problems were like a river of gray water that flowed on and on, yet never met the sea, never found release, was never set free.” (p.131)

Anna decides to go to confession in a Catholic church . A list of sins flows rhythmically: divorce, living in sin, reconciliation, failing her child. When the priest counsels, “You must find you way back to God,” Anna thinks, Not back to God, To myself.

Anne Leigh Parrish has brilliantly come through with her carefully crafted saga, which totally captured my attention. This is a superb novel, written by a gifted author who carefully fills out her characters with creativity and imagination.
amazon review at: http://www.amazon.com/review/R6LL5DV8...

[Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

Let me start out by saying that this isn’t the type of book I normally read. I love my action, thriller and mystery novels with fight scenes and webs of intrigue. So it’s fair to say that I was a little bit doubtful about a book based solely on the characters’ lives. And, as a result it took me a little while to really get into the book, but once I put my preconceptions behind me I was hooked.

The lives of the characters’ drew me in. There was no strong plot like I was use to, it simply the story of the characters lives pushes you forward to find out more. To try and answer the ‘why questions’ that pop up along the way urges you on.

The narrator’s point-of-view jumps between characters, place, past and present. And although this might sound off-putting, it’s actually the complete opposite. It allows you to gain a deeper understanding of what unfolds via each character’s take on a situation. Some characters hate others for the way they’ve been treated, but with the change of perspective you get an insight into why a particular decision has been made. For me it made the read much more interesting, you weren’t given one viewpoint and asked to stick with it, you were shown each person’s ‘truth’ of the situation.

As for the writing itself it both gave a great sense of place and character. Giving away plenty of detail while leaving just enough out to let the reader’s imagination fill in the gaps. Like life, loose ends aren’t always tied into a neat little bundle, and what we are told and what actually happened aren’t always the same. In some cases, you make up your own truth or may never know at all.

The book in essence, has the underlining theme of faith. The religious term of faith is threaded strongly throughout the story, but it is more than faith in that sense. It’s about faith in one’s self and how the decisions you make impacted on the lives of others. Each of the characters are flawed and are battling their inner demons while simply trying to make their way through life.

It’s also about the impact a parent has on their children and the role their own history plays in how they raise them. The view we have of our parents may not always be the full truth and what we see is the result of a life we might know nothing about. This life before their children results in expectations that may never amount to anything. Ultimately, I think it raises a question of whether or not children pay for the sins of their parents?

By the end of the book, I was easily lost in these character’s lives coming to grip with their place in the world. If there is anything negative to say about the book is that it finished way too quickly. I found myself wanting more and I really hope that Anne writes another book that lets us know how the characters are getting on.

This review first appeared on thisiswriting.com

[Ashli]

What is Found, What is Lost discusses the issues of life and religion through four generations of women from one family. The women all come from different places but at the same time their lives are interwoven with similarities. The women question their religion and faith (if they have any) at some point. One of the women is extremely devout throughout her life, but near the end of her life, she begins to question if she did the right thing for her children. Another one of the characters throughout this book states numerous times that she does not believe in religion due to her childhood, but we catch glimpses though the eyes of other characters that in fact that may not be true. The women at one point or another in their lives leave something of their past behind in order to move on with their future. This book explores how at times of hardship we can either question our faith or turn towards to it. One thing that I found interesting about this book is that even though the women are looking to get away from something or someone in order to be happy, they have to work for that happiness and relationship. That is true about everyday life. This book also shows that we have to ask for what we want and have those tough conversations with people to understand or we may never to get to have those conversations due to running out of time. We may never get the closure we need from those conversations and always be left wondering. These characters try to run in the opposite direction of of the generation before them, but in the end they end up in being in a similar situation that they were trying to get away from. They believe that the woman's way of life before them is flawed, but in the end everyone's life is flawed in some way.

[Daniel Ford · Rating 4 out of 5]

Author Anne Leigh Parrish has contributed to Writer’s Bone (including a short story, an essay, and an interview), so I was certain I’d like her latest novel What is Found, What is Lost despite the fact I’m not exactly the target demographic.

In this novel, Parrish explores the themes of motherhood, identity, and religion through the eyes of main character Freddie, as well her mother, grandmother, and daughter. Freddie is one of the most delightful female characters I’ve read in some time, despite the fact she is surrounded by some pretty terrible people (including her late husband Ken, though he earns major points with his one liners from beyond). You’ll find there is no circle of hell low enough for her mother Lorraine. She reminded me of an uber-religious version of Catherine in East of Eden. And then you have Anna, Freddie’s grandmother, who makes 1920s Chicago come alive in a fresh way with the help of her partner Olaf (who is also a shady character, but one with redeemable characteristics).

All of these characters are what make Parrish’s novel really sing. There’s snappy, heartfelt (and occasionally nasty) dialogue that will make you feel as if you’ve known these people your whole life. There’s a genuine lived in quality that weds seamlessly to the prose and plot. I don’t want to give too much away, but the book ends with certain things revealed and resolved, but leaves so much more simmering beneath the surface. It’s an excellent reflection on how real life is messy with no easy answers or solutions. If you’re looking for something meatier than a beach read, put What is Found, What is Lost on your reading docket.

[Pam McGaffin · Rating 5 out of 5]

In Anne Leigh Parrish’s fine debut novel about four generations of women, faith is found and lost -- faith in God, certainly, but also faith in self, faith in love, and faith in the endurance of family. These characters are grasping for meaning and connection in their difficult lives. Freddie, the middle-aged widow who starts the novel, seems to have arrived at a comfortable acceptance of her life after a childhood of abuse and neglect at the hands of her Bible-thumping mother, Lorraine. She and her sister basically raise themselves while their hypocritical mother goes off to preach the gospel. A particularly moving scene shows the girls’ wretched existence and remarkable resourcefulness through the eyes of their concerned grandfather. Lorraine is a character you love to hate as much as stalwart Freddie is one to root for. But no character is completely black or white, and that’s what makes them interesting. Even the secondary characters are vividly drawn. The novel goes back and forth in time, showing how one generation influences the next, from an immigrant couple trying to get ahead to a single mom who makes her living pole dancing. That Parrish somehow manages to tie all these disparate lives together into a satisfying whole is no small feat. This is a layered, character-driven novel for people who love a rich read.

[Phyllis Krall · Rating 5 out of 5]

Four generations of women are woven through the years, connecting them all by the common bond of love and faith.
Freddie is a strong woman, who recently has lost her husband and talks to his ghost to help her make decisions. She reflects on her unconventional childhood and how she is raised by an absent
mother, Lorraine, along with her sister Holly. The years unfold exploring the lives of Lorraine and her mother Anna. Religion , marriage. relationships, and the continuous bond of love are the center of everyone's lives. Freddie's daughter Beth comes home to live and has her own troubles carried over from her childhood relationships with her parents
I really enjoyed reading this book which I won from Goodreads in exchange for an honest review. The rich prose and characterization make this a most enjoyable read.

[Kristin (Kritters Ramblings) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Check out the full review at Kritters Ramblings

A multi generational story that takes you back and forth through four generations of women and each of the issues they have lived with and tried desperately to overcome. Freddie is the main character of the four and with her daughter, mother and grandmother each telling their stories and the moments that make up their lives.

My favorite part about multigenerational stories is the ability to see the effects of previous generations decisions on the next. As well seeing the personality traits pass on or skip generations, I love it!

[Michelle Cox · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a very intriguing story that follows four generations of women, hopping back and forth in time, to examine religion and spirituality, family, love and loss. As each woman is revealed, the reader gets caught up in her particular story, making it harder to judge them so easily for the mistakes made. Parrish's writing is superb - able to seemingly effortlessly draw such a vivid picture with so many tiny details across such a large canvas. Loved going back to this each night and watching it unfold. A must read!

[Sheila Myers · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book did not grip me as a reader but lulled me in by weaving in and out of the lives of five women that are all related and all have their own story to tell. The theme of struggle, loss, questioning one's reason for being, all play a part in this novel. I enjoyed Anna's story the most and felt the author's writing was more fluid in this section which is set during the depression era in Chicago. The writing didn't flow as well in other parts of the story but the characters made up for it. A good read about the struggles of four generations of a family.

[Kayla shaft · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am so glad that news of this incredible novel was spread to me, and i can't be happier i made the decision to read it. Parrish writes so eloquently a tale of love, family, faith and religion. Masterfully written is this poignant novel which leaves you not only thinking, but makes you crave more. What is Found What is lost will not disappoint, be sure to make this one on your list of must reads.

[Monika · Rating 2 out of 5]

Realistic and pretty relatable characters, but also too easy to set aside. This book fell a little flat for me. Read my full review at A Lovely Bookshelf on the Wall.

[Winter Sophia Rose · Rating 5 out of 5]

fascinating, Engaging & Refreshing!!! A Remarkable Read!!!