This poignant tale of the loss of a child, portrayed by the loss of Mary Yelloly in the 1800s and the story of the son of the author as he falls into the world of drug abuse, was far more engaging than I could have ever expected. The pain and the frustration felt by both sets of parents is portrayed beautifully and it seems almost fitting that the author identified with Mary at this time. Mary was still quite young when she succumbed to illness and left behind a tiny legacy of art and hints of love affairs never pursued. The author's son disappears into his drugs, quite literally leaving both of his parents floundering as they watch the young man they've known disappear in front of them.

This would not normally be a book I'd have been drawn to but I was immersed in this story before I'd read fifty pages. The book is sad but hopeful, terrifying but temperate, painful but enlightening. I am grateful that I am not going through what this family is, but realize that it takes so very little to be in that exact same circumstance. I finished this book and felt all the richer for having read it. ( )

Riveting. Captured my attention on every page. ( )

While researching the life of a young woman who died in the mid-1800s at 21 leaving behind a portfolio of watercolors, the author struggles to deal with her oldest child's growing drug addiction.

Myerson's decision to combine these two stories into one book works on some levels and misses on others. Mary Yelloly’s life seems enchanted at first. Born to well-to-do parents, she and her nine siblings live a charmed life on an English estate, cared for by an attentive mother and an accomplished father. The children are all well educated in all subjects, with an emphasis on art. The mother and most of the girls sketch and paint and it is these portraits of everyday life that lead Meyerson to investigate the family. Tuberculosis rears its ugly head and several of the siblings die very young, including Mary.

Myerson’s children also leave a fairly charmed life. They live in comfortable circumstances, attending private school and are doted on by two involved, caring parents. Inexplicably their oldest son, who is never named, begins to smoke skunk, a particularly strong and damaging type of marijuana. He begins skipping school, going out until all hours, and becomes verbally and physically abusive to his parents and siblings. Stunned and bewildered by their son’s complete personality change, Myerson and her husband struggle to help their son and save the whole family from disaster. They ultimately kick him out of their home and suffer as they watch his continued downward spiral into addiction and hopelessness.

Meyerson is brutal in her portrayal of how she vacillates between tough love and wanting to keep her son close no matter what the cost. She questions her intentions and her seeming missteps as a parent, and feels largely responsible for her son’s problems. At the same time, she tries to give her son the room to correct his own mistakes and in doing so allows him to continue his addiction, something she comes to regret. The ensuing stress fractures her relationships with her husband and other children.

Meyerson offers no answers in how to deal with an addicted child, or how to avoid having a child fall prey to drugs. She comes to realize the mistakes that she and her husband made in dealing with their son, but does not think that she has found the right answers. The denial that both she and her husband displayed throughout much of their son’s addiction is chronicled and Myerson acknowledges that a stronger, faster response to his drug habit might have made a difference in the outcome. At the end of the book, her son is still an addict living on the streets, keeping in sporadic touch with his family and refusing to admit that he has an addiction.

While Myerson goes to great length to learn about Mary’s life, a good deal of what she winds up writing about is supposition. Very little is known about Mary’s life and even less about her personality. Myerson frequently refers to the watercolors Mary did of her daily life and surroundings. This is a double-edged sword as none of the paintings are included in the book and this is a major oversight. It is one thing to read descript0ons of paintings and their impact on the writer and quite another to see those paintings for yourself.

Without the paintings and with the lack of information about Mary, her side of the story falls rather flat. Myerson does a good job of weaving her search for details of Mary’s life with her search for answers about her son, but in the end the reader is left with very little satisfaction on either front. This is to be expected when dealing with the bleak subject of drug addiction, but it is frustrating when talking about a chosen figure from the past.

In Sum, Lost Child is a deeply felt book and an insightful tale of how easily a child can slip into drug addiction. While there is no saving Mary Yelloly, one certainly hopes that Myerson's son will be able to save himself. ( )

This book was good in a way that I appreciated the mother's heart toward her teengae son. It was hard to see his attitude and the way he treated his parents while he was using drugs. But so real to the reader that you did not want to stop reading. You always felt for her. The other story that was a parallel, somewhat, of her tracing a family's roots was interesting, but not so necessary to tie them in the same book. It was kind of confusing to me at times too. It was hard to follow that part of the story. ( )

Two and 1/2 stories are interwoven in "The Lost Child"; the author finds a book of paintings rendered by a young woman in the early 1800's, and upon finding out that the artist died when she was only 21, becomes obsessed with finding out more about her. Then there is the heart-breaking story of the author's son's descent into drug addiction, and the impact of the addiction on her family. Then the author gives the reader a brief glance at her relationship with her father.

I'm not too certain why these stories were all interwoven. The author jumps from one to another without segue. Plus the use of second and third person when discussing Mary Yelloly's story sometimes confused me as to who the author was talking about...Mary? Her sister?

The premise is good; her description of her own initial denial of her son's addiction, and then the acceptance of it and the measures she and her husband had to take were raw and emotional. ( )