Lost and Found

Spunes, OR #3

by Tarah DeWitt

A stunning novel of romance and redemption set in the Spunes, OR world, filled with heartbreak and hope from "master of emotion" (Rachel Lynn Solomon) USA Today bestselling author Tarah DeWitt.

Bea always wanted to be a mom. But she never expected she’d have to lose her best friend to do it. Armed with nothing but her best friend’s eggs and a bucket list to complete, Bea’s world is a sea of changes.

When she needs a place to stay, her longtime friend Silas steps in to help. A firefighter grappling with the aftermath of an accident, Silas has his own challenges to work through that have left him cautious and vulnerable.

At first, they expect nothing. But as these two former sunshines knit together in a love that has been unfulfilled until now, a new beginning comes out of the ashes of the past—one that will lead to a love that can withstand all the slings and arrows, joys and triumphs, that life can throw.

Tarah DeWitt's novels

"Pure magic." - Elsie Silver

"[Filled with] melt-your-face off intimacy." - Jessica Joyce

"Aching and sexy." - Julie Soto

Genres: Romance, Friends To Lovers, Contemporary Romance, Contemporary, Small Town Romance, Fiction, Forced Proximity

336 pages, ebook

Expected publication August 4, 2026

Reviews

[Salma [inactive]]

DNF...

I don't read for a month, and this is the book I start with 💀

This book should be lost and never found, because what the hell was that?

My friends and I decided to go in blind with this book, and boy, were we wrong. The premise is just so messy and toxic. The FMC's best friend, Merritt, dies and gives her eggs to the FMC, Bea, and Bea takes them. So Bea goes through pregnancy, childbirth, and all this hassle only because her dead friend asked her to. I'm sorry if I sound insensitive. That's a load of pressure to put on your friend after your death.

Also, Merritt was VERY toxic. She literally sleeps with someone's boyfriend and treats Bea like crap. I'd say Bea dodged a bullet if you ask me. I know Bea says it's her choice, but it genuinely doesn't feel like it. It felt like she was manipulated by the letters her friend sent and the grief of losing her. Bea needed to grieve properly.

Thank you to NetGalley, the author, and St. Martin's Press (St. Martin's Griffin) for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

«────── « ⋅ʚ♡ɞ⋅ » ──────»

˖ ֹ੭୧pre-read:⊹ ࣪ ⑅

Hey, everyone. I haven't read anything in a month due to personal matters, but I'm getting back into it now because I miss it. Let's hope this is a win! I miss you all, and just give me time to catch up on your reading updates!! 🩷

Buddy reading with the lovelies Vicky and Kat 🩷

My first book by this author, so let's hope it doesn't disappoint. Thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for the ARC.

[ivy · Rating 3 out of 5]

࣪ ˖ ֪ꮽ᱖܄ 3.5 stars˚ִִ꒱꒱ ִ݂

⤻ no spoiler review . disclaimer: this book contains a huge theme of grief. i have personally never lost someone uber close to me, so please do not take my word on how well done it is;; make sure that you are in the right headspace to read this 🫶🏻

i am so surprised at how good this book was! admittedly, i haven’t read the first two books of this series, but i decided to request this book because 1. it was on “read now” 2. the cover is absolutely breathtaking. i went in with no expectations, but now i will definitely be on the lookout on tarah dewitt’s instagram waiting for her new releases 👀.

་ 💭 ⊹ ࣪୨୧ preface. ‘lost and found’ follows silas (si) and bea (she has a million nicknames in the eyes of silas) reigniting their friendship after extremely unpropitious shifts in their lives. they are both entering new chapters in their lives and walk through the door with all the sunshine and happiness that they have left, finding it in each other along the way.

⸝⸝ the characters ⁺໒꒱

ᡣ𐭩 — bea. i LOVED her. throwback to my disclaimer: i have not dealt with grief before, so take my words about this next part with a grain of salt. i think the grief was really well done in this book — specifically with her character. the anger she dealt with and showed was palpable, i felt like i truly empathized with her in the scenarios where the most “random” anger was showing up, and i especially loved how she realized what was the root of it and didn’t just take it out on the harmless surrounding peoples. there isn’t one perfect way to grieve (obviously), but i think that she was incredibly mature about it. bea realized that she was internalizing her grief and knew that she had to do something about it (therapy). what i’m trying to say is, she handled it in a sensible way. this book made me realize that people who deal with grief in books don’t necessarily have to be annoying to the readers; i’ve read many a books that have turned their grieving characters into nuisances that are headaches to read about, and i was relieved to witness bea being a fresh interpretation of the vicissitudes of grief.

ᡣ𐭩 — silas. a thousand more silas’ better be pumped into the world because if my man is not like him, i don’t want him!! he would DIE for her. he was such a sweet, caring, and intimate man. he understood bea, he waited for her, and he nurtured her. i loved how he understood her spiritually; he had so much patience with her and let her decide how to move forward with the relationship and how she wanted to live her life and fit him into it.

𖥔 ݁ ˖ ⌗﹒ the reason that i didn’t give this a higher rating was because while i deeply appreciated the characters and adored their personalities, i didn’t really feel connected with them. yes, they were great and i feel a deep respect for both of them.. but unfortunately that didn’t equal a bond.

৻ꪆ ᩚ : the relationship was my favorite part of the book 😭. the thing that stood out to me in this book was the small and intimate ways that they tributed and treated each other. one dream i have in life is to have someone that can predict my every move, someone that knows and remembers, and that that is shown in every move they make for me. bea and Silas treated each other with so much veneration and deep understanding that i really enjoyed reading about.

﹏﹒✦ overall, i enjoyed this book so much more than i thought i would. tarah dewitt is going to become an author that i’m going to be keeping an eye on (in fact, i’ll probably be reading the rest of the series backward). one thing that i treasured was the epilogue 🥹. it was so freaking beautiful and emotional, and i’m sure the people who read the first two books will thoroughly sob. thank you bunches to netgalley for gifting me an ARC of this book, i am so grateful! 💞🪷🌟

⊹ ﹒ ⁺ ﹒ ⊹ ﹒ ⁺ ﹒ ⊹ ﹒ ⁺ ﹒ ⊹ ﹒ ⁺ ﹒ ⊹ ﹒ ⁺ ﹒ ⊹ ﹒ ⁺ ﹒ ⊹

˒˒☁️ pre read ˒˒࿐· started apr 18・xxvi 𖦞.˖
i really need to catch up on my ARCs, and i thought this one looked great to start with 🧡 hopefully it's good!

𑁦ꗃ thank you netgalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review

[Ali L · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every cloud (your best friend dying) has a silver lining (you inherit her frozen eggs). Every time god closes a door (can’t date the guy you like because she had a big crush on him) he opens a window (that’s not really an issue anymore). The joy (learning how to cope with trauma) is in the journey (the trauma). Romance is a rich, complex genre, and DeWitt took some risks here that pay off — Bea and Silas are both imperfect and lovable, some of their choices are unorthodox, and we get to watch it all happen with the bittersweet knowledge that this our last visit to Spunes. (Until you reread the entire series, which you totally can it’s not illegal or anything). I love you, Byrds.

[maria (will I fully comeback?)]

the best thing smp have ever done is putting this book on read now😭😭

_________

FINALLY SILAS’s BOOK!!!!!!! I prayed for time like this

[Maren’s Reads · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tarah DeWitt has done it again! Readers are in for the sweetest treat with this duo 💕 Beta read ☑️

[aira]

pre-read: omg one of my most anticipated for this year and I got the arc 🤭

[Lauren · Rating 1 out of 5]

ARC provided by St Martin’s Press. I almost don’t have words for this. I am so uncomfortable.

Firstly, the plot itself sounds like a joke. It’s absolutely ridiculous. Imagine this… Your best friend dies and leaves you custody of her frozen eggs without telling you first. Then leaves a note telling you to use them. But she left behind no money to continue to store them while you make your decision so you’re basically forced to immediately start IVF while you uproot your entire life to fund the treatment. You’re 30 with no real life and trying bring A WHOLE PERSON INTO THE WORLD. And since she doesn’t explicitly tell you NOT TO, of course using the guy your dead best friend had a crush on her entire life as a sperm donor is totally normal decision not weird at all!

Merritt was the most ridiculous character I’ve probably ever read. Her and Bea’s wildly unhealthy relationship and codependency was creepy and weird. It felt violating and almost inappropriate in a way. No one should ever be expected to be surrogate for a dead person’s child and then forced to raise the child as their own, because that’s what the dead person “would’ve wanted.” Honestly, it’s unhinged. The only two people who were against this erratic fiasco were villainized–meanwhile they’re the only normal ones in the entire book!

Besides the fact that a book with this premise shouldn’t exist in the first place, it was just so boring and relied way too heavily on flashback scenes to convince the reader that the main characters had chemistry. All I got was the ick because I couldn’t get past the horrid storyline.

[Robin · Rating 5 out of 5]

man down so bad he plans to get over his cat allergy by sheer force of will just because she adopted one on a whim

praying at the altar of tarah dewitt


Bookstagram | Blog

[carolina]

ugly cried reading the epilogue 😭😭

[Destiney Bomberry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hey so I did in fact bawl my eyes out reading this. More thoughts to come closer to the release date💕

[kitkat (vacation era ♡︎)]

dnf 💙🧡

to say the least, this book was not for me. i'm sure there's someone who will absolutely adore this one, but that someone is not me. i was a bit wary of the book going into this one- the concept of having your best friend's eggs after she died was an interesting idea, and i was curious. however, i feel like the execution just wasn't there. for starters, her best friend leaves her these eggs in hope that she might be able to help her leave a legacy and have a piece of her. this, i don't mind. what i do mind is that the "best friend" leaves this letter that almost makes carrying the eggs an expectation. there's no easy way to say no to something like this and to make matters worse, the fmc had to tear her entire life apart to make this work. now, as someone with a chronic illness who has lost people to chronic illness, this is a burden i would never put on another person. i've experienced grief and loss, and i just don't think this is the way to handle it. in addition to this, in the flashback povs i never felt connected to merritt, the best friend. if anything, they made me dislike her even more. there were scenes where i felt as if their problems could have been solved very easily if they had talked to each other a bit more. and i get it, it's hard to talk when you're mad, but if a man is getting in the way of things the way silas did, i think there's an issue. which brings me to my next point: silas just happens to be the dead best friend's crush who liked the fmc. but the fmc's best friend also gets a little mad when they do something as simple as dance with each other, and that makes the whole situation a little more awkward. now, all of this being said, i really did not get very far in this book, so please take this with a grain of salt. as i said before, i'm sure there's someone who will like this book, but unfortunately it wasn't for me.

thank you to netgalley and the publisher for an arc! big thanks to salma and vicky for reading this with me as well <3

- preread 💙🧡 -

i haven’t read any books by the author, but this one was highly recommended, so why not?? i’m a little iffy on the whole dead best friends baby thing, but we shall see. fingers crossed that it hits 🤞

buddy reading with my besties salma and vicky

[Jono Mitchell · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is everything I love about Tarah DeWitt’s writing. Her characters feel like real people, her world feels lived in, and while she embraces familiar romance tropes, she never relies on fantasy or convenience. Everything unfolds in a way that feels grounded and believable.

I also think this is some of her most emotionally mature work. She tackles heavier topics with so much care and grace that it’s obvious this story comes from a deeply personal place. But as incredible as that is, the real magic is the yearning. No one writes yearning like Tarah. She gives us crumbs for hundreds of pages, building one of the best slow burns and right-person, wrong-time romances I’ve ever read until it all pays off perfectly.

Between the writing and that epilogue, this book hit me in a way very few romances do. It’s one of Tarah’s strongest books and the perfect sendoff for the Spunes trilogy.

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars

THIS MAN CAN YEARN AND I WAS SO OBSESSED!?!?!?

I was as bit skeptical about this plot, but this book was the definitely of right person, wrong time, which is one of my favorite tropes of all time. Silas and Bea have been into each other since high school, but Bea's best friend has always liked Silas, so he was off limits to her. Now, Bea's best friend has died of cancer and left her eggs for Bea to use to have a child of her own. Due to circumstances, Bea doesn't have a place to stay, so Silas offers his place. Being around each other so much makes it hard for them to ignore their feelings for one another...

Silas was a man obsessed and I loved how much he loved Bea from afar for so many years. We get a lot of flashbacks to them dancing around each other over the years, and it made me just love Silas's character so much more. I do think it was unfair that they weren't together because of Bea's friend having a crush, but I do love a messy romance and this one delivered on that drama and angst. They were fighting SO HARD not to be together, but obviously they could only fight so much before they gave in. This also had so many fun small town elements. I don't love the IVF storyline and thought it was unfair of Bea's friend to put her in that situation, but the romance absolutely sold me and made me love these characters.

[vicky ꨄ︎]

dnf @30%

I went into this book not reading the synopsis at all and that probably wasn’t the smartest idea to do. I could not get behind this premise at all. What do you mean her best friend dies and leaves behind her frozen eggs that are about to expire in two years to her. Like I’m sorry who comes up with that idea. The eggs were left behind for Bea our fmc who decides after reading a very guilt trippy and manipulative letter to have her best friend child. Mind you she doesn’t have the financing at all to have a kid resulting her having to change her whole life to have her friend child. Who mind you is a toxic friend. Also she is forced immediately to make a decision in her depressive state and is shock that her mother doesn’t accept her decision. Bea literally went on to say that Merritt (her friend name) mother really would love another grandchild and I’m here like so, she has other grandchildren. This is a burden to take for someone dying wish.



Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this arc in exchange for an honest review.


Thank you to my girlies salma and kat for hate dnfing with me.

—————————————————————-


𐙚⋆°. preread

Buddy reading with my gorgeous girlies salma and kat so excited this read this book as it would be my first one by this author.

[ellie · Rating 1 out of 5]

this book felt like a horror movie, my god. i genuinely had the jaws music playing in my head the more i read.

you have to be fucked in the head not to be inherently disturbed by a dead woman gifting her frozen eggs to her best friend who now feels morally obligated to be a surrogate while in a grief-stricken depression as deep as Tartarus. Merritt’s eggs are only viable for another year or two, barely giving Bea the chance to truly contemplate whether carrying the baby of her dead best friend is even remotely what SHE wants.

Merritt and Bea’s friendship is written as this epic (platonic) love story, and is why Bea decides to carry Merritt’s eggs… but the more i read about Merritt, through flashbacks and reminiscent anecdotes, the more i discovered that she’s always been an awful friend. from the moment they met to the moment she died. she was petty, spoilt and entitled, and i really did not understand why Bea wanted to 1) be friends with her 2) sacrifice so much of her life and love for Merritt. i didn’t empathise with Bea’s grief because honestly… Merritt dying actually freed Bea from her shackles and it was the first time Bea could actually live her life without Merritt’s constant toxicity. but even then she still manages to stick to Bea like a parasite from beyond the grave.

so their big epic Susannah and Laurel, Thelma and Louise, Blair and Serena duo friendship meant absolutely nothing to me and just disturbed me more than anything, because Bea’s life got infinitely better once Merritt was gone. it was the type of friendship every girl looks back on as an adult and thinks “thank GOD, i am no longer friends with her. how on earth did i convince myself that girl was my friend?” i saw another review say “who needs enemies when you have a friend like Merritt?” and i have not resonated with anything more in a long ass time.

i really held out hope that Bea wouldn’t go through with the surrogacy. i never truly believed she wanted to mother Merritt’s biological child, it just came across as her being a self-sacrificial martyr. i am just really glad Silas wasn’t the bio-dad, because i think i would have launched myself in front of a bus if the baby was biologically Silas and Merritt’s… iykyk.

gotta part ways with Tarah DeWitt. i can’t any more.

[BookishKB]

✨💫 Lost and Found 💫✨

I’ll be sharing my full review closer to publication date.

💖 What to Expect
• Friends to lovers
• Grief & healing
• Found family
• Small town
• Firefighter MMC
• Fertility journey
• Second chance
_ _ _

📅 Pub Date: August 4, 2026
Thank you to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for the advanced copy. All thoughts are my own.

[Kat · Rating 5 out of 5]

the love story equivalent of a warm crackling fire, a quilted blanket and fuzzy socks, and a hot london fog latte in your favorite mug, after days outdoors in below freezing temperatures barely evading frostbite. more to come closer to release day.

✰ 5 stars, I knew there was no way tarah would retire the mustache

special thank you to tarah for your online friendship and the opportunity to beta read for my favorite romance author. I love your weird, and I'm so grateful to have become part of your reader family.

***
pre-read review:
ain’t no way tarah is retiring the mustache

[Anna (annasbookstacks) · Rating 5 out of 5]

can’t see through my tears oh my god

[Julia · Rating 2 out of 5]

Thank you NetGalley for this eARC!

In all fairness, this is my own fault. I hate any kind of pregnancy trope in a romance, so much. But I loved the last two Spunes books and therefore needed to read this regardless. Bad choice.

From the get, the whole concept just gave me the ick. Your best friend dies and leaves you the eggs she froze (weird) with extremely vague instructions on what to do with them (rude), so you opt to have her baby to honor (/clone) her, and you do it all with the dude she was in love with her whole life? And your mom and your friend’s sister are the bad guys for thinking this is a terrible idea?

Also, the relationship between Bea and Merritt was so obsessive and weird and toxic. I don’t even have the energy to get into it, but it was too much.

I’m giving 2⭐️ because I like Silas and I love a mental health rep, but honestly that’s kind of a stretch because I don’t know if I would ever recommend this to anyone.

Please tell me I am not alone in these feelings! But ugh, I’m sad about it.

[jo &#x1f3f9; · Rating 5 out of 5]

YALL ARE GOING TO LOSE YOUR MIND WHEN YOU READ THIS!!!! TARAH DEWITT AT HER BEST TRULY!!! A GORGEOUS BEAUTIFUL BOOK ABOUT GRIEF AND HOPE!!

Ahhh!! I don’t wanna give my full review until closer to release day… but gosh i love the byrds so much. They feel like family to me. Spunes will forever be such a safe space for me. There is so much depth woven into this book it’s actually insane. The epilogue??? I WAS CHANGED. I laughed. I cried. One of my top reads of the year FOR SURE!!!!

[lauren · Rating 5 out of 5]

first and foremost, W H A T are they feeding these Byrd brothers!!! i c a n n o t

second, i genuinely sobbed my way through this book. what an incredible journey of grief, loss, healing, friendship, and motherhood. bea and silas have been THROUGH it and watching them learn to lean on eachother and understand eachother in ways no one else can was such a TREAT. this had all the butterflies of finally getting your high school crush, the yearning for the one that got away, the unbearable weight of dealing with your grief, and the comfort that comes with finding the person you consider home. tarah, i thank you for baring part of your soul in everything you write. this story was truly perfect 😭

literally a million stars for the epilogue alone, it has been such a joy spending the last few years in spunes 🫶🏼

thank you @netgalley and @stmartinspress for this eARC!!

[bonreviewsbooks · Rating 5 out of 5]

One thousand forehead kisses to SMP and Tarah Dewitt for the ARC!! What a beautiful way to end our time in Spunes!!

The tension in this book is some of the best I’ve ever read, building slowly from their high school years through adulthood. The way they circled each other, her resisting the pull to him and him very patiently waiting (and secretly pining) and finally ending up back in his orbit was so beautifully written.

I can’t recommend this entire series enough. I’m a firm believer in reading everything in order, even a small town romance like this because it will add so much more color to the world.

I will miss visiting this fictional town so much 🥹

[ellanna · Rating 5 out of 5]

*sniffle sniffle* this is my fave of the three 😭 Bea and Silas, I love you forever!!! Thank you Tarah for giving us Spunes, I’m still drying the tears from my face at that epilogue 😪

[hailee · Rating 5 out of 5]

thank you to netgalley and the publisher for the arc. all opinions are my own.

this is one of the best books i have ever read and i need everyone reading this to drop what they’re doing and start the spunes, oregon series.

this is a story of hope, of grief, of “we were girls together,” of losing your second half, of finding and trusting yourself, of understanding that to be loved is to be seen, of supporting your loved ones, and much more.

this book has all the lighthearted giddiness of having a childhood crush, the soulcrushing weight of carrying grief with you everywhere you go, the immense relief when you find someone you feel cosmically connected to, and the nostalgic bittersweetness of “the one that got away.”

bea and silas are, to me, two of the most real, fully fleshed out characters i’ve ever had the pleasure of reading about. not only is their collaborative journey beautiful and heart wrenching, but what they each go through on their own had me weepy and emotional. they are so strong & resilient. bea is brilliantly written and carries so much love in her heart, choosing to hope and be brave in the face of her pain. silas is the most selfless, kind, breathtakingly courageous man.

also btw: that man is a YEARNERRRR. the romance was perfect. the way you can feel the undeniable connection bea and silas have throughout the years, knowing that they continue to be “right person, wrong time” year after year.. i’m in pain. the yearning and desire are palpable and my heart was aching alongside them the entire time.

i am so so sad to be leaving spunes and these characters. the byrd family has become my family, and i know they’ll always be there when i’m looking for comfort (or to cry, honestly). also, i need to say that this epilogue had me openly sobbing (like many parts of this book tbh) and i thought it was the perfect way to end this series.

and remember: “What is bravery if not hope in action?”

[Stella]

Excited for Silas' story!!! This one sounds emotionally devastating.

Also, I just peeked the silas&bea Spotify playlist and Stolen by Dashboard Confessional is on there I can't

[Kalie · Rating 5 out of 5]

and what if I cried???!!

[Silvy (silvylinings) · Rating 5 out of 5]

leave me alone to die

[Kirolsen (kirs_papertravels) · Rating 2 out of 5]

I can’t believe I’m forced to write a 2-star review on a Tarah DeWitt book.
Who let her follow through on this plot? My theory is that she made it so obscure and detatched that no one who’s actually been through IVF could possibly relate to it, and therefore no one could call it offensive. because this would literally NEVER HAPPEN to anyone! I’ll eat my kindle if anyone in the world has experienced a similar situation. Not that I need every book to be relatable to personal experience, but a modicum of sense and valid character reasoning would be nice.
The 3 pages of trigger warnings and justifications didn’t help, because I’m not ‘triggered’ by this, it’s just a dumb plot. I wish so badly that I could’ve just vibed with this, but I fear it became a rage read that I finished purely to give fair criticism. In my mind, this is fair, because when did contemporary romance become so damn heavy, anyways? I’m going to judge it accordingly.
It starts to read like a self help book to show how ‘enlightened’ the author is, how sensible and effective this plot is at creating ‘growth’ and ‘healthy relationships.’ It’s too much 😭 just write lit fic or something, girl.
The flashbacks that were meant to show the reader how worthy Merrit & Bea’s friendship was, actually displayed absolute toxic behavior from both of them.
& now, present tense, Bea can’t say anything that isn’t drenched in grief, guilt, or therapy talk. So WHY is she making this huge decision in her fragile state? And why would any friend ask this, or even leave it as an option?
So yeah, basically I was too distracted by this weird plot, that even when the romance and banter was good- which it was, I’m reminded of what’s going on… and lose interest. It was very distracting to the romance trying to take place. This should’ve focused so much more on Silas. Couldn’t this just have been a cute little childhood friends to lovers. Why did it need to be so contrived? DeWitt forced this storyline, and it did not work.

Thanks you St. Martin’s Griffin and NetGalley for this digital ARC in exchange for an honest review. And honest it was.

[joni ౨ৎ]

this book is on my bookshelf rn sobbing

[✨Julie✨]

Heading back to Spunes! 🥹🥰

Thank you to Net Galley, the publisher & the author for providing me with the e-ARC!