What I Loved:

I loved the details in this story. Michelle Cox writes with vivid descriptions providing depth and an immersive experience into her story. It was lovely to read!

How I Felt:

The story is set in the 1930s in Chicago, Illinois, as does the rest of this series. Henrietta has just had a miscarriage and is suffering from depression. Clive has been struggling to aid and console her and feels that a new case might be able to help. This new case is more than Clive expected though and connections between a case Henrietta takes on connects to Clive’s. Together they involve a psychic, an asylum, and a lost child.

As Clive and Henrietta dive into the case, there are lots of twists and turns for the reader. I loved that I was continually surprised as the story unfolded. It made this book fly by for me.

The characters are so amazingly written. Clive and Henrietta are the main characters in this entire series, and I was so pleased that even though this is the fifth book in the series, I was still able to get to know them and didn’t feel lost. I would like to go back and read the other books though because I would like to see the evolution of their relationship (and because this book was so good)!

To Read or Not To Read:

I would recommend A Child Lost to readers that enjoy historical fiction and mysteries. While this is a series, I had not read the previous books and felt it was a good stand-alone to read.

Content Warnings:

References to miscarriage, depression, mental health, domestic abuse, and a missing child.

Where to Find This Book:

A Child Lost by Michelle Cox is available at these sites.

Bookshop | Kindle | Amazon | Goodreads | Barnes and Noble | ibooks | IndieBound | Google

A spiritualist, an insane asylum, a lost little girl . . .

When Clive, anxious to distract a depressed Henrietta, begs Sergeant Frank Davis for a case, he is assigned to investigating a seemingly boring affair: a spiritualist woman operating in an abandoned schoolhouse on the edge of town who is suspected of robbing people of their valuables. What begins as an open and shut case becomes more complicated, however, when Henrietta―much to Clive’s dismay―begins to believe the spiritualist’s strange ramblings.

Meanwhile, Elsie begs Clive and Henrietta to help her and the object of her budding love, Gunther, locate the whereabouts of one Liesel Klinkhammer, the German woman Gunther has traveled to America to find and the mother of the little girl, Anna, whom he has brought along with him. The search leads them to Dunning Asylum, where they discover some terrible truths about Liesel. When the child, Anna, is herself mistakenly admitted to the asylum after an epileptic fit, Clive and Henrietta return to Dunning to retrieve her. This time, however, Henrietta begins to suspect that something darker may be happening. When Clive doesn’t believe her, she decides to take matters into her own hands . . . with horrifying results. 

Just the Facts:

A Child Lost by Michelle Cox
Series: Henrietta and Inspector Howard, Book 5
Genre: Historical Mystery
Page Count: 408 pages
Publisher: She Writes Press
Pub Date: April 28, 2020

Michelle Cox is the author of the multiple award-winning Henrietta and Inspector Howard series as well as “Novel Notes of Local Lore,” a weekly blog dedicated to Chicago’s forgotten residents.

She suspects she may have once lived in the 1930s and, having yet to discover a handy time machine lying around, has resorted to writing about the era as a way of getting herself back there.

Coincidentally, her books have been praised by Kirkus, Library Journal, Publishers Weekly, Booklist and many others, so she might be on to something.

Unbeknownst to most, Michelle hoards board games she doesn’t have time to play and is, not surprisingly, addicted to period dramas and big band music. Also marmalade.

• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram
• Link
• Goodreads

I was provided an advanced reader’s copy of this book for free. I am leaving my review voluntarily.

View all adult book reviews
View all children’s book reviews