This. Book. I was instantly hooked by the plot of the story. Such a unique story and I loved the character build. I loved it!

Reading The Lost Story was like getting a warm hug. This was such a joy to read. This is not my usual type of book, and I kind of went into it blind, but I’m so glad I took a chance on it.

The found family element was my favorite part of this story. When Emilie barrels into Jeremy’s life, the pair could not be more different. Yet, he still offers to help her. That offers brings Rafe back into his life and even though many years have passed and the boys have been through so much, it’s still like coming home. Even with all their history they still make room for Emilie and accept her with open arms.

The setting was also a big part of this story and I absolutely loved getting lost in Shenandoah. This is my first novel by this author and I just loved her writing style. She really transports you to this world and makes the magic seem real. I loved the magical creatures and the matriarchal society. Bonus points for the Stevie Nicks/Fleetwood Mac love.

Thank you to NetGalley and Ballantine for a review copy. I will definitely be reading this author’s next book!

Thank you Meg Shaffer for this absolutely wonderful book! I loved this fairy tale for adults. The plot, the characters, the magical land - it was pure perfection. Thank you!

The Lost Story by Meg Shaffer is a story inspired by C. S. Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia. It's about two boys that go missing in the West Virginia state forest and then mysteriously reappear six months later. And now, many years later, they return to the same forest to confront what happened. This time they bring Emilie with them, as her sister vanished there as well. This story was magical and heartwarming, and I really enjoyed it. It talks of repaired relationships and special friendships. Thanks to NetGalley for the free digital review copy. All opinions are my own.

I was swept away by this story and these characters. This is a story about found family, lost love, the ways we hide, and what it takes to be found.

This review pains me. But I just could not rate The Lost Story higher than a 3. I loved the Wishing Game so much and wanted to fall in love with this one too. It wasn't there for me. I don't have a whole lot to say.

We don't actually get to the fantasy/Lost World until the 50% mark and in my opinion that's just too late into the story. The first half was so, for lack of a better word, boring. The fantasy world, Shanandoah, had so much potential to be great. But it just felt flat and underdeveloped.

3 stars for the effort and the unique fairy tale element at the beginnings of the chapters. And it wasn't ALL terrible. The characters were loveable. Rafe and Jeremy's relationship was fun and interesting.

The Lost Story by Meg Shaffer
#magicalrealm
⭐⭐⭐⭐✨

I do wish for future readers that the synopsis would be rewritten to expose a little bit less of what happens. Since I sign up for these ARCs usually months in advance, I have almost always already forgotten what the book is to be about. That said, there is still much more to be told in this book. How/why they became friends. Their family's dynamic. And more.

This book is definitely worth a read. I will still continue to pick up all of MS's books. I like her damaged characters and honestestness she gives them.

I do wish she had given more description to the story of Rafe, Jeremy and Emilie's trek through the woods to get to the magical realm that the boys had disappeared into 15 years ago.

#romance
#NetGalley
#randomhousepublishing
#ballantinebooks

I think I let my own hype for this one get too high, because it was slightly disappointing to me. Her debut last year was one of my top ten books of the year, I truly adored that book so, needless to say, I was very excited for this one. But it just didn't at all give me the same feelings I had when reading The Wishing Game. The writing/prose was stunning, I tabbed this one a lot. I liked the characters just okay, but I didn't realize this was going to be so romance heavy. I liked the narrator interjections. The pacing was too slow-building and the plot fell a little flat for me. The world-building was severely lacking. I mean, it's Narnia inspired, I expected way more enchanting, magical aspects. Overall, it was just okay, it really didn't live up to my own expectations. 3.5 rounded up.

Whimsical, compelling story that is reminiscent of fairy tales and yet so appealing to adults. A love song to reading and books and magic and everything that makes us creatively human. Pacing and plot was even and entertaining. I was hooked almost immediately.

Meg Shaffer does it again!

I loved the wholesome, magical, whimsical feel of The Wishing Game, and The Lost Story is just as fantastic!

In a quick, simple summary, this story is about two boys that stumble into a fantasy world, grow up, then find their way back to the 'real world' then have to deal with all the complications of life that come along with their experience.

Anyone that likes fairytales will love this book.

I am already highly anticipating her next book!

Fifteen years ago, Jeremy and Raffe went missing from a West Virginia state forest only to return six months later without explaining where they went. Now, Rafe is an artist who has no memories of what happened in those 6 months and is haunted by his unknown past. Jeremy is the only one who knows the truth about their disappearance and works as a private investigator who specializes in finding missing girls and women.

Emilie hires Jeremy to find her sister who went missing from the same forest as the lost boys, years before they went missing. Jermey and Rafe have not spoken in 15 years, but they can only save Emilie's sister by working together. The three must head to the magical realm where they spent those 6 months to find everything they lost.

The narrator breaks the third wall while explaining parts of the story throughout. It reads like a fairy tale for adults and I loved every minute. I could not put this book, inspired by The Chronicles of Narnia, down.

This is such a wonderful book. I love everything about it: the characters, the world, the magic, the realness of everything is so well done. I love the real world and the magical world. Just thinking about it makes me want to read it again. The reason I didn't give it five stars is that due to the m/m love interest I, personally, was not able to get super invested, but I do think that the love story aspect was excellently done.

I’d give this an average rating. It wasn’t anything super special but it was good. The beginning was a bit boring until it got into the action. I would recommend if you like fairytale like stories and don’t mind wading through the boringness to get to it. I really wish I enjoyed it as much as I expected too. Meg Shaffer’s debut book was in my Top 10 last year.

This book was not for me. The character development was incomplete, the writing and dialogue didn't work for me, and it felt like young adult even though it isn't. The initial pacing was so incredibly boring and then suddenly we get three characters that travel together as if they are all close and trust each other. The way they communicated to each other felt stilted and strange. Once things started to get magical, I had hopes that I would enjoy the book, but even that seemed off somehow. I kept reading, thinking that things would become clearer. I love a strange read, so I wanted things to take a turn toward something that would resonate with me. I didn't enjoy the story teller character breaking the fourth wall. It felt insulting, like having the joke or scene explained to me after the fact, when I was aware what was happening while it was happening the first time. I think it's safe to say that this book wasn't for me.

This was ok. It had its moments but nothing too memorable. And it wasn’t really the magical fairytale that I was craving right now. But I would still recommend. It definitely tackled some mental health issues and I thought the love story was really sweet.

Chronicles of Narnia meets A Curse So Dark and Lonely!

This book started off incredibly dark and scary, so I thought it was going to be a more thriller esque book. It ended up being emotionally impactful as well as more magical than I expected. I want to keep this review spoiler free because I genuinely feel you need to go into this book with no expectations.

I was never prepared for where this story ended up twisting and turning along the way. I loved the world of Shannendoah, there honestly wasn’t enough of it and based on the way the book ended - I hope we get to see more of it.

There was also a beautiful, and yet again, unexpected love story in this novel that I won’t soon forget. Jeremy and Rafe’s relationship was probably one of the singularly best parts of this book.

If you’re looking for an emotional fairy tale esque fantasy novel to get lost in, this one’s for you!

Note: TW for parental abuse.

Meg Shaffer is going to become a go to author for me, I already adored “the wishing game” and I can’t wait to see what else she has in store.

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Random House for the advanced read of The Lost Story by Meg Shaffer.

Bestselling author of The Wishing Game, Meg Shaffer has created a modern day fairy tale inspired by C. S. Lewis’s The Chronicles of Narnia.

As boys, best friends Jeremy Cox and Rafe Howell went missing in a vast West Virginia state forest, only to mysteriously reappear six months later with no explanation for where they’d gone or how they’d survived… 15 years later, they are reunited to help another lost individual in those same woods.

I am not normally drawn to magical realism. However, I really enjoyed Shaffer's The Wishing Game and was so glad to have read this book as well. I am a fan of Meg Shaffer's writing and love how she weaves the fantastical plots, characters, and settings into the real world lives of her characters. These characters were so well developed that you couldn't help cheer for them, hurt with them, and root for their happiness. It was moving, gripping, and enchanting.

(There are several dark and sensitive themes, including abuse, homophobia, PTSD)

I may need read all the magical realism I come across, but I will read any of Meg Shaffer's future books. I rated this book 4.5 stars, rounded up to 5 stars.

What a charming and feel good story! This was my first novel by Meg Shaffer and I loved it. The writing is solid and descriptive and you are taken on a beautifully detailed story inspired by C.S. Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia. Thank you to NetGalley and random House Ballantine Books for the ARC.

I really enjoyed this story. It's like the best parts of The Chronicles of Narnia meets the whimsy of House of Salt and Sorrows. I liked the story between Rafe and Jeremy. While the story starts off following Emily and her search for her missing sister, I was way more invested in the parts following the guys. It felt like their story was complete.

I am SO horribly disappointed in this book. I know that seems like an odd way to start a 3-star review, but for as much as I loved The Wishing Game, I had such high hopes for this one, but it really did miss the mark.

What I loved - the fantasy aspect of the story, and the lead up to it. Meg Shaffer has a way with making fantasy reality. The premise of this book just seems perfectly natural and acceptable. Two missing boys, gone for months, then suddenly reappear again with no reasonable explanation for where they were. Fifteen years later, it all becomes clear, and then the magic truly begins. There were a lot of C.S. Lewis comparisons in other reviews, but except for the obvious one, I really saw very little connection (granted, its been a very long time since I read that series). But the imagery and unfolding of a magical world, with good and evil, beauty and darkness, was simply spectacular. I wanted more of THAT.

I also read quite a few reviews that wanted less "real world" buildup and more fantasy. I actually liked the amount of backstory that came at the beginning of the book, so I wouldn't change that. I would have simply added more fantasy to then build THAT part of the story to the level it should have been.

And I'm a bit of an outlier in that I enjoyed the narrator (maybe because it interrupted other parts of the book that I didn't enjoy as much).

What I didn't love - the gay romance spin. It was clear that that was going to be a factor in the book fairly early on, but it really took a hard left turn and went further than I would have preferred. Fantasy/magic and LGBTQ romance are such polar opposite genres, it simply didn't work for me to combine the two, and it detracted from the fantasy aspect of the storyline.

I was also disappointed in the portrayal of the characters. For me, a book is ALL about its characters; without the characters its just a bunch of words. Whether I love or hate them, I need to feel something for them, and I didn't get that here. Emilie could have been quirky and fun; instead, she was just annoying and immature. I actually enjoyed Rafe and Jeremy's characters <u>separately</u>; together they seemed (again) immature and stereotypical. Shannon needed way more development and lead-in. Similarly, the dialogue between the characters struggled. It felt unnatural and contrived, like everyone was simply trying too hard to be witty and quotable.

Bottom line - I wish this book had stuck with one genre, built up the fantasy realm and spent more time creating characters that were more appropriate for an adult novel and less YA.