Rating: 
Summary: more suspense than horror
Review: I've neve understood why Peter Straub is labeled and
always place in the horror section. He has written some
damn fine mysteries. And this book is a continuation of one of these characters.This book is really a little bit of everything, but suspense covers it best. I enjoyed this book on a number of levels. I read it in one sitting because I was really drawn right into the story. I think
Straub's strong point has always been his characters and this one does not disappoint. The Story, in short is this. Tim Underhill's sister in law passes
away. He goes back home for the funeral. His nephew goes missing and Tim does what he can to find him. What he finds is not quite
something he can explain to his brother. Very entertaining read.
Rating: 
Summary: Horror Written In Style
Review: Mr. Straub has for many years been a master of Horror . Famous for books like "Ghost Story" and "Black House" he has produced here what I would call a masterpiece of horror and terror.Written from the point of view of three characters it gives the story a depth not found in conventional stories.The book slowly draws you in and it becomes hard to put it down.The book is really about a hanted house and it is how it is hanted and how it affects the characters that really draws you in.I have read alot of horror in my life . This book rates as one of my favorite.Mr. Staub is a master storyteller and his book is a must for any horror fan.After you read this try his book "Ghost Story",it is a great read too.
Rating: 
Summary: good book, but not worth the time
Review: This is the first Peter Straub book I have read, and I must say the way it started I was excited that it was going to be a really good book, and the more I read, the more I liked it. Although, all good things must come to an end, and an abrubt end it did! I found the ending of the book to be anti-climatic, I was expecting much more to come out of the story, and more detail would have been nice too. The ending was too unbelievable and too vague to even make it worth while.
Rating:
Summary: Drew me in then disappointed me
Review: I like the fact that Straub can draw you in on the first page and make it interesting for quite awhile but then lets you down with a feeling of that's it??? at the end. Not in the least bit scary, more like a murder mystery than horror fiction, I kept waiting for more details about "Ronnie" and just how he pulled it off but alas they were never to come. It needed more character detail. What happened to Mark was just plain fantasy, totally unbelieveable and disappointing. I was left unsatisfied. Sorry Peter. I've read some of your other books that were much better.
Rating:
Summary: i love, i love, i love my little kalendar girl
Review: tim underhill travels to his town to investigate the disappearance of his nephew, mark. mark's disappearance follows his mother's suicide and coincides with increased activity of a local serial pedophile and murderer. i read this book in under 24 hours; it's a slight book, compared to previous straub efforts, but it has in common with those an occasional liquidity of prose and better-than-average narrative structure. the book's comprised of narrative slices offered by tim's journal, mark's POV, mark's friend jimbo's confessions to tim and the omnicient third person narrator. slices overlap and corroborate each other, which is kinda nice and quirky. new to straub is a sweet, hopeful strain, as mark enters another dimension of sorts to both escape the pedophile and be with lili kalendar, a ghost of a chick who used to live in the house across the alley and the secret daughter of joseph kalendar. ah, the House. Lost Boy, Lost Girl continues straub's fascination with houses (has he ever read House of Leaves?), for the house becomes a physical presence in mark's life, and the house has been altered by expert karpenter kaledar and equipped with sekret passages so serial murderer kalendar could move throughout its rooms and floors unbeknowst to the women held captive there. a compelling read for the plot, but not particularly memorable overall. and not scary at all either.
Rating: 
Summary: Childish story
Review: I have always considered Peter Straub one of the most intelligent horror writers of today. However, Lost boy, lost girl reads like a juvenile tale. Scary? Horrific? Boring, boring, boring. I cannot believe this book is a product of Straub's pen. Enough to say I found Jimbo the most interesting person of the story. Yawn!!
Rating:
Summary: lost boy lost girl good read
Review: Fifteen-year-old Mark Underhill and his friend Jimbo Monaghan are, ostensibly, the kind of kids who are going nowhere--baggy-clothed and skateboard-appendaged, they slouch around their run-down neighborhood and say "yo" more often than their fathers would probably like. But beneath the attitude, the boys are surprisingly thoughtful and nobly loyal to one another, and Mark, at least, is intelligent, capable of using "dyad" in a sentence: "'Look, there's another cop!' Mark said. 'They come in, like, dyads.'" His intellect is a plus, since Mark has a lot to figure out in Peter Straub's tense and exceedingly creepy--don't read it if you're alone in the house creepy--lost boy lost girl. After his mother's suicide (an instance of overkill, as it were, as the method she adopted was thrice effective), Mark's attempts to understand what happened to her land him in the thick of a family mystery and on the trail of a serial killer or two. His obsession leads Mark in particular to investigate an abandoned property directly behind his own house, a building every bit as creepy as Norman Bates's Victorian manse. The creepy goings-on in the house will have you almost screaming at Mark to get the hell out of there. Part murder mystery, part ghost story, the book is actually diminished by its spectral nonsense, which renders the story less genuinely scary. The book's ending in particular is too unbelievable to be satisfying. Straub's novel nonetheless is well worth the read. Just remember to have a buddy with you when you crack it open.
Rating:
Summary: A different kind of horror story than you're used to
Review: Peter Straub's last few books have been clunkers - and that's being extremely kind. For several years he has written far below his abilities. The man who wrote such masterpieces as "Ghost Story", "Shadowland", and "Floating Dragon" produced truly awful books with names such as "Mr X" and "Koko". Now, however, Straub has returned to his glory days with his latest work, "Lost Boy, Lost Girl". And while the style is typical Straub, the story is quite different than you'll be used to. Because the horror in this story is solidly based in reality - a serial killer is on the loose - but there are definite elements of a typical ghost story in this novel. The difference is, the spectral elements in this Straub novel do not have evil intentions. Selfish intentions? Possibly, but they are most definitely not evil. There are two distinct stories going on here. One is the search for the aforementioned serial killer. The other is, basically, fifteen-year-old Mark Underhill's search for the purpose of his existence. He's helped along in this, after a few false starts, by the ghost that lives in the house behind his. The conclusion of this second story is, of necessity, a sad one. It's also somewhat unfulfilling. But I doubt that we've seen the last of Mark Underhill.
Rating:
Summary: Lost Boy - did you lose your mind?
Review: I just finished this book and I am pretty disappointed. The idea behind the book was pretty fascinating, so this book could have been great, but it was just so dull. As I was reading it, I kept asking myself, ok so when is something going to happen. It took forever for anything interesting to build up. I think I was 3/4 through the book before it started to get interesting, and then at the end, I felt really cheated.
Rating:
Summary: Glorious setup with disappointing climax
Review: Straub is an amazing writer. He has a facility with language that is matched by few of his peers. While not as prolific as his buddy Stephen King, I think he is more imaginative and far more literary. And damn, the man writes a good ghost story. I loved every element of this story from the family tensions to the deserted house that scares everyone to the serial killer that lived next door. But what I didn't love was the way he attempted to resolve everything. The ending made no sense and wasn't explained very well. In short, it was an intangible as the ghosts that inhabit his novels. Better luck next time, Mr. Straub.
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