MTGNexus

Can Life from the Loam return an MDFC which is a land on the back half of the card only to hand? Valakut Awakening // Valakut Stoneforge for example.

No. This is due to Life from the Loam targeting the card. The shorthand reminder is: Unless you are playing/casting the card, or it is already on the battlefield with the back face up, only the front face exists. So, as far as Life from the Loam is concerned, Valakut Stoneforge doesn't exist because when it targets (or tries to target) the card, it sees an Instant.

This shorthand also explains why Crucible and Kess work the way they do with MDFCs (and Adventures in the case of Kess). These do not target the card. Instead they provide a permission to play/cast the cards from an unorthodox location. Since you are simply given permission to play/cast them, you can take into account alternate characteristics when doing do.

I kind of thought so, but surprisingly I haven't played much with MDFCs yet, so I thought I'd double check. I'm assuming this applies to library search effects like Expedition Map even if they don't say "target" land since you would effectively only "find" the spell half?

Correct. If anything tries to find/target/choose/etc. an MDFC, it can only do so based on the front face (or, the face that is up if on the battlefield).