Americas
![Andrea Lankford - [object Object] author](https://res.cloudinary.com/readsomnia/image/upload/authors/a_B001JP21PM.jpg)
Trail of the Lost: The Relentless Search to Bring Home the Missing Hikers of the Pacific Crest Trail
** AN AMAZON "BEST BOOKS OF THE MONTH" FOR AUGUST 2023 (Biographies & Memoirs) **
From an award-winning former law enforcement park ranger and investigator, this female-driven true crime adventure follows the author's quest to find missing hikers along the Pacific Crest Trail by pairing up with an eclectic group of unlikely allies.
As a park ranger with the National Park Service's law enforcement team, Andrea Lankford led search and rescue missions in some of the most beautiful (and dangerous) landscapes across America, from Yosemite to the Grand Canyon. But though she had the support of the agency, Andrea grew frustrated with the service's bureaucratic idiosyncrasies, and left the force after twelve years. Two decades later, however, she stumbles across a mystery that pulls her right back where she left off: three young men have vanished from the Pacific Crest Trail, the 2,650-mile trek made famous by Cheryl Strayed's Wild, and no one has been able to find them. It's bugging the hell out of her.
Andrea's concern soon leads her to a wild environment unlike any she's ever encountered: missing person Facebook groups. Andrea launches an investigation, joining forces with an eclectic team of amateurs who are determined to solve the cases by land and by screen: a mother of the missing, a retired pharmacy manager, and a mapmaker who monitors terrorist activity for the government. Together, they track the activities of kidnappers and murderers, investigate a cult, rescue a psychic in peril, cross paths with an unconventional scientist, and reunite an international fugitive with his family. Searching for the missing is a brutal psychological and physical test with the highest stakes, but eventually their hardships begin to bear strange fruits-ones that lead them to places and people they never saw coming.
Beautifully written, heartfelt, and at times harrowing, TRAIL OF THE LOST paints a vivid picture of hiker culture and its complicated relationship with the ever-expanding online realm, all while exploring the power and limits of determination, generosity, and hope. It also offers a deep awe of the natural world, even as it unearths just how vast and treacherous it can be.
On the TRAIL OF THE LOST, you may not find what you are looking for, but you will certainly find more than you seek.
From an award-winning former law enforcement park ranger and investigator, this female-driven true crime adventure follows the author's quest to find missing hikers along the Pacific Crest Trail by pairing up with an eclectic group of unlikely allies.
As a park ranger with the National Park Service's law enforcement team, Andrea Lankford led search and rescue missions in some of the most beautiful (and dangerous) landscapes across America, from Yosemite to the Grand Canyon. But though she had the support of the agency, Andrea grew frustrated with the service's bureaucratic idiosyncrasies, and left the force after twelve years. Two decades later, however, she stumbles across a mystery that pulls her right back where she left off: three young men have vanished from the Pacific Crest Trail, the 2,650-mile trek made famous by Cheryl Strayed's Wild, and no one has been able to find them. It's bugging the hell out of her.
Andrea's concern soon leads her to a wild environment unlike any she's ever encountered: missing person Facebook groups. Andrea launches an investigation, joining forces with an eclectic team of amateurs who are determined to solve the cases by land and by screen: a mother of the missing, a retired pharmacy manager, and a mapmaker who monitors terrorist activity for the government. Together, they track the activities of kidnappers and murderers, investigate a cult, rescue a psychic in peril, cross paths with an unconventional scientist, and reunite an international fugitive with his family. Searching for the missing is a brutal psychological and physical test with the highest stakes, but eventually their hardships begin to bear strange fruits-ones that lead them to places and people they never saw coming.
Beautifully written, heartfelt, and at times harrowing, TRAIL OF THE LOST paints a vivid picture of hiker culture and its complicated relationship with the ever-expanding online realm, all while exploring the power and limits of determination, generosity, and hope. It also offers a deep awe of the natural world, even as it unearths just how vast and treacherous it can be.
On the TRAIL OF THE LOST, you may not find what you are looking for, but you will certainly find more than you seek.
Editorial Reviews
** AN AMAZON "BEST BOOKS OF THE MONTH" FOR AUGUST 2023 (Biographies & Memoirs) **
** American Scientist, "Summer STEM Reads You Won't Want to Miss" **
** LitHub CrimeReads, "10 NEW BOOKS COMING OUT THIS WEEK" **
** Library Journal Book Pulse, "In the Media" **
"[G]ripping... Trail of the Lost is about the hikers and the efforts to find them, but it's also a rich, multilayered narrative that works on three different levels... Trail of the Lost is written with a clear, fast-paced, straightforward prose that still manages to be beautiful and immersive. It is also as full of hope and humanity as it is packed with pain, grief, danger, and tension. This is a book in which the PCT is as much of a character as every person Lankford writes about, and that balance makes it worthy reading."
―NPR
"Summer is a great time for adventures, even the armchair kind! Andrea Lankford's Trail of the Lost is perfect for this kind of read."―American Scientist
"When author Andrea Lankford says that she put
'a lot of blood, sweat, tears, and broken bones' into her new work of nonfiction, Trail of the Lost, she's not speaking in metaphor... [this is a] book that satisfies and educates. It also paints a picture of the remarkable generosity of people along the trail, from Tarr to the so-called 'trail angels'... the book is also a portrait of hope and resilience, especially when it comes to Langford, Tarr, and the families of the missing."―San Francisco Chronicle
"The real science of searching in nature is the most interesting-and disturbing-part of Lankford's account…She writes openly about her search and rescue missions for NPS and how she is still haunted by those that failed. People who weren't found in time, or weren't found at all. She has faced families trying to emotionally recalibrate from 'rescue' to 'recovery.' She makes us care about the lost men through details of their lives before the PCT, and the volunteers keeping the searches going."―The Spectator
"[A] riveting story, incredibly well-written and exhaustively researched."―
** American Scientist, "Summer STEM Reads You Won't Want to Miss" **
** LitHub CrimeReads, "10 NEW BOOKS COMING OUT THIS WEEK" **
** Library Journal Book Pulse, "In the Media" **
"[G]ripping... Trail of the Lost is about the hikers and the efforts to find them, but it's also a rich, multilayered narrative that works on three different levels... Trail of the Lost is written with a clear, fast-paced, straightforward prose that still manages to be beautiful and immersive. It is also as full of hope and humanity as it is packed with pain, grief, danger, and tension. This is a book in which the PCT is as much of a character as every person Lankford writes about, and that balance makes it worthy reading."
―NPR
"Summer is a great time for adventures, even the armchair kind! Andrea Lankford's Trail of the Lost is perfect for this kind of read."―American Scientist
"When author Andrea Lankford says that she put
'a lot of blood, sweat, tears, and broken bones' into her new work of nonfiction, Trail of the Lost, she's not speaking in metaphor... [this is a] book that satisfies and educates. It also paints a picture of the remarkable generosity of people along the trail, from Tarr to the so-called 'trail angels'... the book is also a portrait of hope and resilience, especially when it comes to Langford, Tarr, and the families of the missing."―San Francisco Chronicle
"The real science of searching in nature is the most interesting-and disturbing-part of Lankford's account…She writes openly about her search and rescue missions for NPS and how she is still haunted by those that failed. People who weren't found in time, or weren't found at all. She has faced families trying to emotionally recalibrate from 'rescue' to 'recovery.' She makes us care about the lost men through details of their lives before the PCT, and the volunteers keeping the searches going."―The Spectator
"[A] riveting story, incredibly well-written and exhaustively researched."―
Readers Top Reviews
Jeremy Booty
The Pacific Crest trail beckons to thousands each year to fulfill their dreams of finding nature and themselves while walking its 2000+ mile length from Mexico to Canada. This is a book about three men who disappeared over the course of a few years while hiking the trail and about a group of people obsessively trying to bring them back home. Lankford, a former Park Ranger and an RN, tells their stories while giving the reader insight into hiker culture and the dangers inherent in this type of hiking. This is also a story about the terrible limbo the families of the missing exist in and length that the volunteers looking for them will go to. This is not a mystery per se. There is no evidence that crimes were committed against any of the hikers. It is a great story about human nature, both the good and bad parts.
Lea PearlJeremy B
Trail of the Lost is a fascinating, harrowing story about the PCT Missing and the emotions their families wade through to simply bring their loved one home. Readers are taken on an incredible journey through each hiker's story. Lankford provides information that is easy to absorb. I found myself captivated right from the beginning, invested in each hiker's story, wanting to bring them home just like their families. As well as a brief history and other ongoings of the Pacific Crest Trail, Trail of the Lost also provides a look into the sometimes eerie hiker culture and how much of a toll physically and mentally walking 2653 miles over 5-6 months through various weather situations and terrain can take on a person. In the end, this book wasn't really what I thought it would be going into it. As I neared the end, I realized it wouldn't wrap up like I hoped. Overall, I'm glad to have read it and I do recommend this book to those that enjoy true crime mysteries and hiker culture, but I probably wouldn't read it again.
Lara BachmanEthan
While I love the essence and idea of the book, I do not feel like it was written in a way that it was easy to follow the characters. I also feel like there was too much information and all for a not that satisfying ending. I learned a lot about the Pacific coast trail and the thru hiker experience but I think this book was trying to go too many different ways.
HLMnLara BachmanE
Propulsive story of how saints and families of missing hikers banded together to not only search, but to develop and refine the search process (crusade, really). Against: The enormity of the wilderness. The limitations of law enforcement. The charlatans, fabulists, and internet trolls.
AnonHLMnLara Bach
Read it in two nights flat late into the night on work nights. I haven't done that since Ready Player One a few years ago and Harry Potter as a kid.
