The finder of forgotten things in this novel is Sullivan (Sulley) Harris, an intermittently successful dowser (person who can determine where to site a water well). When he helps residents find good water easily, they are tempted to think he can also find other things they can no longer locate. That’s the title and one of the lead characters, but the real focus of the novel is something so terrible it needs a distracting theme – The Hawk’s Nest Tunnel Disaster, America’s worst industrial disaster. Probably well over a thousand workers, mostly Southern African-Americans, died from silicosis while building a tunnel for a power plant for a subsidiary of Union Carbide on the Gauley River in central West Virginia in the nineteen thirties. "Loudin Thomas introduces a multifaceted cast desperately trying to survive the Great Depression in 1930s West Virginia, in this strong historical. . . . The small-town plot's set against the real-life Hawks Nest Tunnel disaster. . . . giving Loudin Thomas impetus to underline the impact of acts of caring in a community." --Publishers Weekly. "In a hardscrabble 1930s setting, complex characters wrestle with justice, mercy, inequality, honesty, and the fact that they are all prodigals still searching for the way home. Loudin Thomas delivers a stunning tale of one of the worst industrial disasters in U.S. history, underlined with a moral imperative to love one's neighbor that still hits home today."--Library Journal. "Sarah Loudin Thomas never disappoints! The Finder of Forgotten Things brings together a rich cast of characters, each at war with conflicting desires and ultimately destined to decide whether, even in the worst events, redemption waits to be discovered."—Lisa Wingate. The author, Sarah Loudin Thomas, is a fund-raiser for a Christian Children’s Ministry in Asheville and the author of several award-winning books.
Minneapolis, Minnesota: Bethany House, 2021. 352 pages. Trade paperback.