Lost Souls is an excellent addition to the Cainsville series that gives a new take on an urban legend as well as furthering Gabriel and Olivia's relationship.

Good solid story from Armstrong. Always a little nervous when she starts a new story but I needn't have worried.

"The disappearing hitchhiker is one of the hoariest urban legends, and no one knows that better than Gabriel Walsh, a lawyer who grew up on folklore and myth. When Patrick—author of books on the supernatural—brings him the case of a hitchhiking woman in white who vanished on a country road after accepting a ride from a businessman, Gabriel knows the Cainsville elder is just trying to wheedle into his good graces. But Gabriel is a man in need of a mystery, one that will get him back into someone else's good graces. His investigator, Olivia Taylor-Jones, has blown town supposedly on a simple vacation. But when she left there was a rift between them and…he misses her.

Gabriel is well aware the only thing Olivia loves more than a good mystery is a weird one, and this hitchhiker case more than fits the bill. As Gabriel digs into the case, though, he's forced to face ghosts of his own and admit that the woman in white isn't the only one who has lost her way.

With Lost Souls, New York Times bestselling author Kelley Armstrong weaves an unmissable novella-length tale connected to her fan-favorite Cainsville series."

LOVE Subterranean Press, just wish they could get better cover artists...

You can't ever go wrong reading something written by Kelley Armstrong. She is a titan in her genre! I absolutely love that she revisits our favorite characters!

I love love! Kelley Armstrong's Cainsville series. This novella, told from Gabriel and Patrick's points of view is such a fun story to bridge the gap between books 3 and 4. If you're new to the Cainsville series, the mystery in Lost Souls will keep you interested, however, you will lose some of the references to the relationships between the characters.
I cannot recommend this novella or this series or author enough. If you want, start with Omens, so good!.

I love paranormal series and this urban legend case fascinated me. I also enjoyed discovering more about the characters and learning more about Cainsville. I was hooked and after I finished this novella was all I could think of that I need to finish this series.

The mystery in this was interesting but I never read any of Armstrong's other novels so the main characters remained rather vague to me because I missed the previous world building from the other installments.

The case they were working on was intriguing but the resolution was rather disappointing. The writing was really good though and it was fun to read.

Kelley Armstrong is always a fun, quick read for me, and this novella was just that. I would recommend this to any fan of hers or any reader looking for a fun, quick, supernatural read.

The Cainsville series is a series that has quickly grown to become one of my favorites, and Gabriel is a strong reason why. Such a complex and deep character that Armstrong has created with him, and even though the series is already in it's fourth book, he still remains mostly shrouded in mystery. Lost Souls is a novella focusing on the delightful Gabriel and while it doesn't lay bare all of his secrets, it does provide a more intimate glimpse of exactly what makes him tick. The old boy has feelings he rarely shows, and I absolutely loved seeing him sort of pine for Olivia while she's away. Oh, and there's is a storyline about an urban legend that Gabriel is investigating, and that wasn't half-bad either. But Gabriel and his feelings are the important part, and fans know this :-)

Lost Souls turned out to be a wonderful filler while I impatiently wait for the fifth and final book in this series. I can never have enough Gabriel, and I'm really hoping that Armstrong will grace us with another Gabriel story in the near future.

I was more than astonished to find that it's been almost one and a half years since I binge read the first three books of this series. Somehow Gabriel, Olivia and all those other amazing characters have managed to brand themselves into my memory, which made it easy for me to get right back into the story.

While, as a reader of the Cainsville series, you're more used to Olivia's narration, this short is told from Gabriel and Patrick's POV only.
Patrick, wanting to get in Gabriel's good graces, presents Gabriel and Olivia with a new mystery case to investigate, in the hopes of working with them and winning their trust. A case about a ghost story. Being the skeptic he is, Gabriel only takes the case to set things right with Olivia, who, unsurprisingly, is on fire for anything supernatural.
And so starts another exciting investigation full of surprises, dead ends and deceits.

I truly loved this. How could I not, given that I got a good and private look into Gabriel's stubborn head and Patrick's deviously scheming mind?
There were quite a few laugh-out-loud moments, as well as glimpses into Gabriel's sad childhood. It was so much fun to see him squirm uncomfortably whenever confronted with anything just slightly feeling-related, or struggling to subdue his emotional defense mechanisms.

This was a perfect companion novella to an amazing series that I adore.
Now that I'm once more hooked, I guess Betrayals is up next.

Oops... I didn't realise that this book was part of a series! This novella ties in to the Cainsville series, and to be honest... as I've noticed with Armstrong's other work, you need to be familiar with the main series to get the full benefit. Thankfully, her storytelling is so easy to read, I don't see this being a hardship.

IThe writing is really enjoyable and it automatically appealed to me because it features the old hitchhiker urban legend, this would probably have nailed a full 5 stars if I had read the rest of the series and knew what the hell was going on. The characters have already been established in the main series (I assume) so there were constant references to their past which distracted me from the narrative, I think this book would have been perfect as a self contained stand alone.

Gabriel is an unsympathetic main character, you would have to have affection for him from the earlier books to really connect with him in this. He lacks empathy for regular humans and he's immature, whiny and self sabotaging in his personal relationships... without the context to work with, he's just a pain in the ass and a bit cringeworthy to read.

Gabriel takes on a case of the mysterious ghostly hitchhiker who lures people away from the road and then vanishes, thinking that having an intriguing case on board will help him win back the affections of Olivia, his legal firm's investigator. Of course, things are never as simple as they seem and the 'fun' case turns out to be more than he bargained for.

All in all, it's the writing that makes this story worth a read - unless you're a follower of the Cainsville series though, I would probably recommend picking up another book by the author to get you started

Thanks to Netgalley and publishing company and Kelley Armstrong for the ARC.
I have read this author's works, and loved them, but the Cainsville series is my least favorite. Somewhere in the books I seem to get lost in the storylines, and this novella was pretty much the same. I don't think I even figured out as to why people where killing themselves or Gabriel not. Sorry, I didn't get this one.

I'm back! This is my first WIR since last January. Did you miss me? I have been reading debuts and they get full reviews and I have been a bit slow at reading other books. Although I am back now with the books I have read in between debuts. Let's get to it. What did I read?

I received Kelley Armstrong's novella Lost Souls from the publisher via NetGalley a few weeks go. This story is set in the world of the author's Cainsville series with Gabriel on the case to debunk a popular urban legend of a girl in a white dress hitchhiking on a quiet back road. Gabriel is a lawyer and wants to solve the case but his investigator (and love interest?) Olivia is out of town. Determined the solve the mystery Gabriel has to face his past in order to find the clues that leads him to the woman in white.

I haven't read any of the book from the Cainsville series but I still enjoyed this novella. The story was told through POVs from two of series' characters - Gabriel and the supernatural Patrick. Through their inner dialogue we get to learn both about the opposite character but also about the background characters such as Olivia and her boyfriend Ricky. I really enjoyed how the urban legend played out and thought it had just the right amount of creepy....just like a good urban legend. Fans of this series need to check out Lost Souls.

I generally hate love triangles and frankly I'm surprised my intolerance for love triangles hasn't kept me from reading and enjoying all of the Cainsville books that have come out so far. What has kept me reading the books, other than my love of Armstrong's writing, is the fact that I cannot see Liv ever really settling for Ricky (the blandest "bad boy" ever, who is more Mary Sue than renegade). To me, Gabriel won the contest in the first book by being about a million times more interesting and multi-faceted than Ricky.

In Lost Souls we get to experience an investigation through Gabriel's eyes and get a smidgen more insight into how the past has shaped his character and his ability to participate in relationships. Basically, this novella drives home why he struggles to unclench long enough to tell Olivia how he really feels about her.

I found the case interesting and engaging as well. I liked that it took a common ghost story and built from there.

I would recommend this novella to anyone who has read the Cainsville novels or anyone who is interested in trying out Armstrong's writing.

I read my first book City of the Lost, by Kelley Armstrong a couple of month's ago. The book was OK, not as fabulous as I had hoped it to be, but still enough interesting to make me want to tread more from the author. And, this novella felt like a good second book to read. Now, I don't know anything about Cainsville, but this novella was very good and I hope to get a chance to read the books in the series some day.

Lost Souls starts with Gabriel getting a case from Patrick about a hitchhiking woman in white who vanished after getting a ride in the care of a businessman. It doesn't seem to be a very troublesome case, but it's just the case that Gabriel needs to lure Olivia back after they had an argument and she went on a holiday with her boyfriend. So, this case may be just the thing to smooth things over since he doesn't want to lose her as an employee and as a friend. But, there is something really weird going on and even Patrick starts to think that something is off with the case...

Now, I'm a newbie with this series, but I do love paranormal series and this urban legend case fascinated me. I also enjoyed discovering more about the characters and learning more about Cainsville. In short, I was hooked and after I finished this novella was all I could think of that I need to read this series and I'm actually right now thinking of buying the first book...

I was not aware this was part of an ongoing series at the time I requested it. I have not read the previous books in the series and I am OCD about that.

I am very grateful to have been sent a copy of this for review, and I have obtained the first book in the series. I will leave a full review, with gratitude to both author and publisher once I have read it. Since it is hitting shelves today, I wanted to make sure I did leave some sort of feedback for being given the opportunity and I am excited for this book. I am giving it 3 stars because that is my average rating all books start out at with me. I expect ALL books to be 3-stars. Most move up at least to 4's. Bad books move down. DNF's are 1-stars. But I assume most books will be pleasantly entertaining when I start them, so 3 is a good place to be. Anyway, I would just like to again express my gratitude and I will leave an honest review on GoodReads upon completion. Thank you!

LOST SOULS by Kelley Armstrong is a companion novella in the author’s contemporary adult, paranormal Cainsville mystery/suspense series. The time frame happens somewhere between the events of DECEPTIONS (Cainsville 3) and BETRAYALS (Cainsville #4) but can be read as a stand alone without too much difficulty although I recommend reading the series in order for cohesion and backstory especially the ongoing mythical dynamics between Gabriel, Olivia and Ricky. LOST SOULS is not a necessary installment to the series but does reveal some background about Patrick’s connection to Gabriel.

Told from dual third person perspectives (Gabriel and Patrick) LOST SOULS focuses on the urban legend of the ‘vanishing hitchhiker and the lady in white’ - in the case of CAINSVILLE everything happens for a reason, and an explanation is exactly what attorney Gabriel Walsh is hoping to explore. Whether a hoax or a happenstance, Gabriel is out to prove, one way or another, that the vanishing hitchhiker is more than an urban legend.

LOST SOULS follows Gabriel as he reluctantly teams up with Patrick –a man whose true identity to Gabriel is kept secret-but a man who has kept watch over our leading hero for most of his life. Patrick is trying help keep Gabriel occupied during his PA’s absence-Olivia Taylor-Jones-an absence Gabriel feels down to his bones. What ensues is the search for the truth, and the revelation of mystical and magical creatures that are up to no good.

LOST SOULS is a ‘spirited’ story line with witty banter, rapid back and forth conversations, and a time-honored mystery that appears to recycle every few years. The relationship between Olivia and Gabriel continues to be tested, not only with Olivia’s love for Ricky but by ongoing, repetition of history and fabled lore. The premise is entertaining and imaginative; the characters are animated, revealing and energetic. The final resolution and reveal was a little abrupt but it is a novella so long winded explanations are not usually forthcoming.

Copy supplied by Netgalley

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Every time I read a book by Ms. Armstrong, I am reminded why I like her books so much. In this novella from the Cainsville series, this isn’t an exception in her arsenal of books that are well-written, have wonderful characterizations, and have great plots. While Gabriel, Liv, and sort of Patrick investigate the report of a girl hitchhiker who was wearing a white gown and disappears after awhile, a great deal of their past comes up and they must deal with their own strange friendships/relationships. I forgot just how interesting all of their interactions are, and how much Gabriel must overcome to become the person who can have a relationship with someone. Love this by-play. The backdrop while they are investigating the mystery can get wonderfully eerie at times, which I loved and definitely added to the tension. This novella was part ghost story, part relationship-oriented, and part fun. If you have read the series, you will love this. If you haven’t read the series, I’d recommend reading the series from the beginning, as all the books are great! Highly recommend! Thanks to NetGalley and Subterranean Press for the e-book which I voluntarily reviewed. This exact review will be posted on both Amazon and Goodreads.