Rating: 
Summary: ::good read!::
Review: i relaly enjoyed this book. maguire creates a character that (while not being likeable) is both sincere and believable. winnie is ambiguous and somehow ironically endearing. :-) i really liked it.
Rating: 
Summary: avid reader
Review: After reading Wicked, I was hoping that Maguire could conjour up the same magic with Lost. However he falls short. While trying to bring back childhood memories of legendary stories of our childhood, he tangles the reader in a jumble of metaphore that strangles the flow of the story instead of enlightening it. It appears that Maguire had three or four ideas for this book, and that he could not make a decision on which one to follow so he tried to use all of them. At times he seems to trip over his own storyline leaving the reader with a very unpleasant taste in their reading appitite. Lost is an appropiate title for this work, because that is what it should be-lost. Maguire displays a great mind in his other novels, and hopefully that brilliance will shine through with his next book. As for this read, spend your time on something else. If you are a Maguire fan, and you haven't read Lost yet, pick up a book by a new author and give them a chance instead of tarnishing your image of Maguire.
Rating:
Summary: Lost me
Review: Be warned, Lost is a huge blunder by the author. It features a very unlikeable main character, Winnie Rudge. Winnie is a female Scrooge and the book starts out with her doing a remarkably mean thing. Later--much to late--in the book we find out why Winnie is such a mess but by that time you'll no longer care. People don't behave normally in this book. The characters make speeches instead of having converesations and the plot wanders all over the literary map. Is this a take on Christmas Carol? Is it a Jack the Ripper story? Is it a classic ghost story? The author can't seem to make up his mind and so he fails. I didn't like Winnie. I didn't care about her feckless cousin and I just couldn't embrace the story.
Rating: 
Summary: Now for a different take on LOST . . .
Review: Oh what a thankless task is that of the writer who dares to step beyond the sentimental claptrap of countless other novels that deal with GUILT; catch the soul in its attempt to flee the crime of being human; and summon very imperfect - indeed despicable - characters to answer for their denial of LIFE.What is a ghost story? No, really. Think about it for a moment and you'll begin to understand that Maguire doesn't care a fig for the chains and sheets: LOST is a story about guilt, with the artful twist that Ebeneezer Scrooge-like devices lose their cartoon dimension in this novel, grow up, and finally can no longer avoid confronting their very imperfect selves. Only one decision has to be made in this novel: Do you stick around and live; or do you succumb, punch your ticket, and relieve both the world and yourself of your miserable presence? LOST is not an easy read, but then nothing this chewy is. The author employs a device to draw you into the main character (Winnie is her name) by revealing plot - not using the well-trod footpaths of dialogue and expository description, but by cornering Winnie in her mind where her many attempts at fleeing (pick one: life, love, career, friendship) manifest as a story, the source of whose plot you begin to suspect has some relationship to Winnie herself. It is no coincidence that when the surrounding characters in the story get too close to Winnie something quite arresting happens: The typeface used in LOST changes; the text becomes suddenly double-spaced Courier; and we are in Winnie's head - writing what at first glance appears to be a novel. Her best efforts to disguise its real source are reflected in the cynicism with which she realizes that the dysfunctional worlds of Scrooge, Alice in Wonderland, and Peter Pan (among others) have now become hers in fact. It is this cynicism, I think, more than any other aspect of the book which presents the greatest hurdle for the reader. Yet . . . even as you're ready to give up on Winnie, the other characters in LOST don't - and at some point if you are very careful, very attentive, you will sense that something is shifting in the story. The contempt you hear in all the other reviews that preceded mine stems from the author having fleshed the main character in this novel in such a way as to guarantee that you will find little opportunity to be sympathetic to her. The characters that orbit around Winnie become collateral damage while you grope through, easily, the first third of the novel trying to find someone to care about. Such a suspension of your disbelief - so large an investment - had better pay out at the end. I would argue that it does. I give Maguire 4 stars for one simple reason: This story had to have been extraordinarily difficult to write. Not just the story-within-a-novel-nature of its expository device, but the courageousness of trusting (at least ONE reader, me) would be patient enough to stay with him even as he betrays little to be sympathetic with in the central character of the story. I was genuinely surprised at how much I cared about Winnie - no, you won't get from me when, just this: Stay with it. I have never read this author before - this is my first exposure to him - and this story was so chewy it warrants a rereading. Skye
Rating: 
Summary: Never Found
Review: Having read and loved Wicked and Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister, I gleefully grabbed my new copy of Lost and stopped my current book mid-read to dive in. What followed was confusion, disappointment, and eventually, anger. With his first two efforts Maguire proved himself to be a gifted storyteller, and I am left to question whether or not he actually wrote his latest effort himself. In brief -- the book is a garbled, meandering mess featuring a self-indulgent heroine who fails to illicit any sympathy from the reader. The schizophrenic plot is in constant identity crisis, leading the reader on a not-so-wild goose chase in and around various familiar tales -- A Christmas Carol, Jack-the-Ripper, Peter Pan, etc. -- only to land with a thump at the unresolved conclusion of Winnie's personal journey, which was never terribly interesting in the first place. I am off to sell my copy of Lost to my local used bookstore, if they'll relieve me of it. I don't have the heart to place it on my bookshelf, where I'm sure its kin will attempt to edge away and distance themselves from their Ugly Stepsister.
Rating:
Summary: not maguire's best work
Review: it seems mr. maguire has hit a creative rut, having found a formula and now simply repeating the process for each new novel. oh, well... stick with "wicked" or "confessions of an ugly step sister."
Rating:
Summary: Good Premise Falls Slightly Short
Review: I have to admit, the cover of this edition is what first caught my attention when I saw this book. Then I read the description on the back and the premise jumped out at me as being very original. I picked this as my first Gregory Maguire book. The premise is this. The main character is supposedly a descendant of the man Dickens based Scrooge on. She returns to England to her great-great-grandfather's house to visit a cousin. Once she arrives, the house is haunted and the adventure begins. I really like Maguire's style of weaving in various legends and fairy tales ranging from Dracula to Peter Pan to Jack the Ripper. I also like how multiple storylines criss-cross the chapters. I was disappointed in the second half of the book though. The merging of the storylines almost seemed like an afterthought, and the story ended with a "pffft" instead of with a "bang". I would recommend this book to others. Just don't get too worked up during the first part of the book.
Rating:
Summary: Dreadful
Review: I rarely don't finish reading a book once I've started it, however not only did I not finish Lost, I actually pitched it right into the garbage. Now normally I'd never treat a book so badly, however this book is an exception. So Lost, Good Bye.
Rating:
Summary: Lose Lost
Review: This book stinks! I'm so irritated -- Two hundred pages in and I can 't figure out where the book is going. I not even going to finish it, I don't care how it ends. I was conflicted about the protagonist, Winnie, are we supposed to like her or hate her? This book is all over the place -- adoptions, ghosts in the walls, a missing cousin and Dickens. What is this nonsense? I was so disappointed because his previous two books were SO good. I read about 100 books a year, Wicked is up there in my top 5 all time favorite books. Even Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister, not as gripping but still one of those novels you just gobble up. Bypass this one and read his first two books you won't be disappointed
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant author has feet of clay after all
Review: If you have not ready Gregory Maguire's first two novels, by all means treat yourself to the joy that is "Wicked" and "Confessions of a Wicked Stepsister." If you have read them both and cannot get enough of this author, borrow a copy of "Lost". The saved purchase price will perhaps lessen the stinging disappointment that is "Lost". Twenty pages into this book I still had hope. Halfway through the book, I struggled against premature disappointment. Twenty pages to go and I am melancholy for the real Gregory Maguire.
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