Lisa Wingate is a bestselling author from the United States. Her main goal is to spread positivism via her stories. She has published dozens of books, all of which have become international hits.
Wingate was in school when a teacher took notice of her writing abilities. So much so that she said she expected to see Lisa’s name in publications in the future. The same teacher began reading Lisa’s stories aloud in class, which only made her more enthusiastic about writing. But her dream of becoming a published author did not come true right away.
One of Lisa Wingate’s popular novels, ‘Tending Roses,’ published in 2001, was inspired by her grandma’s life story. This was only the first novel to be inspired by true events in Lisa Wingate’s life. The author’s stories can all be exactly traced back to one or more occurrences that she either saw or heard about. Writing is an adventure for the author. She has no idea how an idea will develop, even when it is inspired by a real-life event. Her one certainty is that her stories will conclude on a positive note.
Today, Lisa lives with her husband in North Texas.
Lisa Wingate Books in order
Tending Roses Series
- Tending Roses (2001)
- Good Hope Road (2003)
- The Language of Sycamores (2005)
- Drenched in Light (2006)
- A Thousand Voices (2007)
Texas Hill Country Series
Blue Sky Hills Series
Daily, Texas Series
Moses Lake Series
Carolina Chronicles
- The Sea Glass Sisters (2013)
- The Prayer Box (2013)
- The Tidewater Sisters (2014)
- The Story Keeper (2014)
- The Sandcastle Sister (2015)
- The Sea Keeper’s Daughters (2015)
Outer Banks Series
Standalone Novel
Similar authors
- Kristin Hannah’s The Nightingale follows two sisters separated by ideals and circumstances. They both try to survive in war-torn France during WW2.
- Delia Owens’s Where the Crawdads Sing follows Kya, a wild and unruly kid. The novel chronicles the ups and downs of her life as a lone survivor among the marshes.
See also: Pam Jenoff Books in Order.
Most recommended books
- Before We Were Yours (4.38 Goodreads score)
- Dandelion Summer (Blue Sky Hill #4) (4.36 Goodreads score)
- A Sandy’s Seashell Shop Christmas (4.25 Goodreads score)
- The Story Keeper (Carolina Heirlooms, #2) (4.23 Goodreads score)
- Drenched in Light (Tending Roses #4) (4.23 Goodreads score)
Awards
Lisa received a Carol Award and Goodreads Choice Award for her novels.
Latest releases
Lisa’s latest book is The Book of Lost Friends, released in 2020.
Book summaries
Tending Roses (2001)
When Kate Bowman temporarily moves to her grandmother’s Missouri farm with her husband and baby son, she learns that the lessons that most enrich our lives often come unexpectedly. The family has given Kate the job of convincing Grandma Rose, who’s become increasingly stubborn and forgetful, to move off her beloved land and into a nursing home. But Kate knows such a change would break her grandmother’s heart. Just when Kate despairs of finding answers, she discovers her grandma’s journal. A beautiful handmade notebook, it is full of stories that celebrate the importance of family, friendship, and faith. Stories that make Kate see her life—and her grandmother—in a completely new way….
Good Hope Road (2003)
Twenty-year-old Jenilee Lane, whose dreams are as narrow as the sky is wide, doesn’t imagine any good could come out of the tornado that has ripped across the Missouri farmland where she makes her home. But some inner spark compels her to take action. To rescue her elderly neighbor Eudora Gibson from the cellar in which she’s been trapped. To make her way to the nearby town of Poetry, where the townspeople have begun to gather in the only building left standing. To collect from the devastated landscape fragments of life that lie strewn about in the tornado’s wake: letters, photographs, and mementos that might mean something to people who have lost everything. Eudora Gibson didn’t think Jenilee had it in her. But the girl she’s hardly noticed for years is now surprising her—stepping forward with a bravery that inspires Eudora to face her own bitter past. Brought close by tragedy, the two will learn lessons about the resilience of the human spirit and the ties that make a community strong. And together, they will travel to a place that once lay beyond their dreams.
The Language of Sycamores (2005)
Karen Sommerfield has been hiding from the big questions of her life – the emotional distance in her marriage, her inability to have children, and her bout with cancer. Getting lost in her high-powered career provides the sense of purpose she yearns for. Until the day she’s downsized out of her job and the doctor tells her the cancer may be back. It’s a double blow that would send anyone reeling.It sends Karen to Grandma Rose’s old farm, where her sister has made a seemingly perfect life. Opening herself to the unexpected, Karen finds a lonely child in need of nurturing and insights into her family’s past. In the quiet of the Missouri Ozarks, where the sycamore leaves whisper their soft, secret language, she begins to discover answers – and a joy to make her life complete.
Drenched in Light (2006)
Once a gifted ballet dancer, Julia Costell understands the joy of body and soul lost in a perfect moment. But after buckling under the demands of a professional dance career, she’s landed with a thud in an unglamorous job as a guidance counselor at a performing arts school. Living back home with her parents and feeling lost, Julia is afraid she’ll never soar again—until the day young Dell Jordan is sent to her office.In Dell’s writing, Julia recognizes not only her own despair, but also luminous sparks of hope. But as Julia fights to forge a brighter future for one disadvantaged student, she is drawn into startling undercurrents of conflict and denial within the academy. Now, as she is tested in ways she never imagined, Julia begins to discover that even though her life has seemed off course, she’s been on the right path all along…
A Thousand Voices (2007)
Once trapped in a world of poverty and neglect, Dell Jordan knows she was one of the lucky ones. Adopted at thirteen, she was loved, mentored, and encouraged to pursue her passion for music. By twenty, her future has expanded in exciting new directions—a year abroad with a traveling symphony, teaching music to orphans in Ukraine, and applying for a scholarship to Julliard. But underneath Dell’s smoothly polished surface lurk mysteries from the past. Why did her mother abandon her? Who was her father? Are there faces somewhere that look like hers—blood relatives she’s never met?Determined to find answers, and unable to share her emotional uncertainty with her adoptive family, Dell sets off on a secret journey into Oklahoma’s Kiamichi Mountains. Drawn by the only remaining link to her origins—a father’s Native American name on her birth certificate—she travels into quiet wooded valleys, into the heart of the modern Choctaw Nation. There she will find connections to a long and proud heritage and begin to answer the questions of her heart. In the voices of her ancestors, she’ll discover the keys to a future unlike anything she could have imagined.
Texas Cooking (2003)
No one is more surprised than Colleen Collins when she’s offered a job writing fluffy magazine articles about rural Texas cooking. But after only a few days in the charming little town of San Saline, the big-city reporter is falling for the local residents, and finding it impossible to resist the infuriating True McKittrick, a local boy-made-good whose mere presence makes her feel alive…and at home.
Lone Star Cafe (2004)
Virginia-based publishing executive Laura Draper goes to Texas to face-lift a newly acquired magazine. Reeling from the project’s endless snags, a sudden breakup with her boyfriend and her widowed dad’s depression, Laura is in crisis when a detour leads her to a tiny rural spot called the Crossroads, where two elderly sisters run an old-fashioned caf . She is powerfully drawn to the timeless values the Crossroads represents reminders of her own abandoned dreams and her late mother’s wisdom as well as to local Graham Keeton, a former military pilot shadowed by a mysterious grief.
Over the Moon at the Big Lizard Diner (2005)
Archeologist Lindsey Attwood is distraught that her ex-husband has taken their eight-year-old daughter to Mexico for the summer. To take her mind off her worries, she agrees to visit her twin sister Laura and best friend Collie to help find stolen fossilized dinosaur tracks. But Lindsey soon discovers more than she bargained for, including a friendly mutt and hunky cowboy/veterinarian Zack Truitt.
A Month of Summer (2008)
Changes aren’t in Rebecca Macklin’s plans when she receives a long-distance call from the Dallas police. Her aging father has been found repeatedly wandering the city streets alone, and his wife has suffered a serious illness and landed in a nursing home. Despite the demands of the busy LA legal practice Rebecca shares with her husband, she must put aside old resentments and return to her childhood home. When Hanna Beth Parker hears about the arrival of her stepdaughter, Rebecca, who has stayed away for decades, she knows something is terribly wrong. Suddenly, the last person she’d ever turn to for help is the only one she can count on. But forging a relationship with Rebecca will require awakening old ghosts. In this moving story of separation and forgiveness, two women will unravel the betrayals of the past, examine the yearnings of the heart, and discover the truest meaning of family.
The Summer Kitchen (2009)
With her adopted son missing and the rest of her family increasingly estranged, SandraKaye Darden is drawn to the little pink house where her Uncle Poppy once provided security. But what begins for Sandra as a simple painting project to help sell the house becomes a secret venture that starts to change everything…Cass Blue is having trouble keeping food on the table since her mother died. When Sandra shows up with sandwiches for the neighborhood kids one day, Cass has no way of knowing that the meeting will lead to the creation of a place of refuge that could reunite a divided community.In this moving story of second chances, two unlikely allies realize their ability to make a difference…and the power of what becomes known as the Summer Kitchen to nourish the soul.
Beyond Summer (2010)
When eighteen-year-old Tam Lambert learns that her family’s upscale home is in foreclosure, the life she’s known is forever changed. Tam and her family must move into a tiny house in a changing Dallas neighborhood called Blue Sky Hill…New resident Shasta Reid-Williams knows nothing of real estate schemes when she and her husband purchase a home in Blue Sky Hill. To her it’s the perfect place to raise her children. Better yet is getting to know Tam, who lives right across the street. When neighbors realize that a corrupt deal could force them from their homes, friendships and loyalties are tested. Over the span of one summer, two young women discover the strength and maturity to do the impossible. They find that even in Blue Sky Hill, life-altering relationships and amazing possibilities can begin to blossom…
Dandelion Summer (2011)
All her life, Epiphany Salerno has been tossed like a dandelion seed on the wind. Now, at sixteen, she must move to the low-rent side of Blue Sky Hill and work where she’s not wanted: in an upscale home on The Hill.J. Norman Alvord’s daughter has hired a teenager to stay with him in the afternoons. Widowed and suffering from heart trouble, Norman wants to be left alone. But in Epie’s presence, Norman discovers a mystery. Deep in his mind lie memories of another house, another life, and a woman who saved him.As summer comes to Blue Sky Hill, two residents from different worlds will journey through a turbulent past, and find that with an unexpected road trip through sleepy Southern towns comes life-changing friendship…and clues to a family secret hidden for a lifetime.
Talk of the Town (2008)
Between Hollywood glamour and small-town secrets, what is the truth? The show American Superstars is the hottest thing on television, but its associate producer, Mandalay Florentino, is worried. She’s just arrived in the tiny town of Daily, Texas, to arrange a surprise “reunion concert” for hometown finalist Amber Anderson. Only it turns out everyone in town seems to know the secret. And paparazzi are arriving. And word from Hollywood is that Amber has disappeared with a “bad boy” actor. Can anything go right in this tumbleweed town?Imagene Doll loves her town of Daily, Texas, but things are lonelier without her beloved husband. Life seems dull. At least until that fancy-dressed woman pulls into town, looking terrified and glamorous all at once. Soon life’s not the least bit boring as Imagene–and the rest of Daily–find themselves at the center of a media maelstrom…with a young girl’s future on the line.
Word Gets Around (2009)
Lauren Eldridge had avoided returning home to Daily, Texas, until her father confesses to being in over his head. Paying back an old favor, he’s invested in a horse that’s supposed to be the star of a new Hollywood movie. Only the horse won’t behave. And Lauren is the best trainer in the state. Convinced to return, she soon finds more than she bargained for when the movie’s screenwriter turns out to be leading-man handsome.This movie may be Nate Heath’s last shot at turning his career around. He didn’t have high hopes at first, but the town of Daily may be just what everyone needs to find hope and healing. And maybe even a little romance.
Never Say Never (2010)
Kai Miller floats through life like driftwood tossed by waves. She’s never put down roots in any one place–and she doesn’t plan to. But when a chaotic hurricane evacuation lands her in Daily, Texas, she begins to think twice about her wayfaring existence. And when she meets hometown-boy Kemp Eldridge, she can almost picture settling down in Daily–until she discovers he may be promised to someone else. Daily has always been a place of refuge for those the wind blows in, but for Kai, it looks like it will be just another place to leave behind. Then again, Daily always has a few surprises in store–especially when Aunt Donetta has cooked up a scheme.
Larkspur Cove (2011)
Adventure is the last thing on Andrea Henderson’s mind when she moves to Moses Lake. After surviving the worst year of her life, she’s struggling to build a new life for herself and her son as a social worker. Perhaps in doing a job that makes a difference, she can find some sense of purpose and solace in her shattered faith.For new Moses Lake game warden Mart McClendon, finding a sense of purpose in life isn’t an issue. He took the job to get out of southwest Texas and the constant reminders of a tragedy for which he can’t forgive himself.But when a little girl is seen with the town recluse, Mart and Andrea are drawn together in the search for her identity. The little girl offers them both a new chance at redemption and hope–and may bring them closer than either ever planned.
Blue Moon Bay (2012)
Heather Hampton returns to Moses Lake, Texas, to help facilitate the sale of a family farm as part of a planned industrial plant that will provide the area with much-needed jobs. Heather’s future fiance has brokered the deal, and Heather is in line to do her first large-scale architectural design–if the deal goes through.But the currents of Moses Lake have a way of taking visitors on unexpected journeys. What was intended to be a quick trip suddenly morphs into Valentine’s week–with Blaine Underhill, the handsome banker who just happens to be opposing Heather’s project. Spending the holiday in an ex-funeral parlor seems like a nightmare, but Heather slowly finds herself being drawn into the area’s history, hope, and heart.
Firefly Island (2013)
At thirty-four, congressional staffer Mallory Hale is about to embark on an adventure completely off the map. After a whirlwind romance, she is hopelessly in love with two men–fortunately, they’re related. Daniel Everson and his little boy, Nick, are a package deal, and Mallory suddenly can’t imagine her future without them.Mallory couldn’t be more shocked when Daniel asks her to marry him, move to Texas, and form a family with him and motherless Nick. The idea is both thrilling and terrifying.Mallory takes a leap of faith and begins a sweet, mishap-filled journey into ranch living, Moses Lake society, and a marriage that at times reminds her of the mail-order-bride stories. But despite the wild adventure of her new life, she discovers secrets and questions beneath her rosy new life. Can she find answers on Firefly Island, a little chunk of property just off the lakeshore, where mysterious lights glisten at night?
Wildwood Creek (2014)
With love and loss tangled together, how was she to know where her life would lead?Allie Kirkland has always heard the call of her father’s unfinished destiny. When she’s offered a production assistant’s job on a docudrama filming in the hills near Moses Lake, Texas, the dream of following in her director-father’s footsteps suddenly seems within reach. The reenactment of the legendary frontier settlement of Wildwood is a first step into the film industry. A summer on set in the wilderness is a small price to pay for a dream. But in 1861, the real Wildwood held dangerous realities. Town founder Harland Delavan held helpless residents, including young Irish schoolteacher Bonnie Rose, in an iron grip. Mysterious disappearances led to myths and legends still retold in the region’s folk songs. Eventually, the entire site was found abandoned. When filming begins, strange connections surface between Allie and the teacher who disappeared over a century ago, and everyone in Wildwood–including Blake Fulton, Allie’s handsome neighbor on the film set–seems to be hiding secrets. Allie doesn’t know whom she can trust. If she can’t find the answers in time, history may repeat itself…with the most unthinkable results.
The Sea Glass Sisters (2013)
Elizabeth Gallagher has been balancing on the ragged edge for a while now. Then a rough case on the boards of her 911 operator’s job collides with a family conflict at home, and Elizabeth finds herself finally coming apart at the seams. A four-state road trip—trapped in a car with her mother—is the last thing she needs. Their destination may be beautiful Hatteras Island, but the reason for going is anything by pleasant. After one disastrous hurricane, and with a second one working its way up the coast, it’s time to convince Aunt Sandy to abandon her little seaside store on North Carolina’s Outer Banks and return to the family fold in Michigan. But when the storm sweeps through, the three women will discover that sisterhood and the sea can change hearts, lives, and futures . . . often in the most unpredictable of ways.
The Prayer Box (2013)
When Iola Anne Poole, an old-timer on Hatteras Island, passes away in her bed at ninety-one, the struggling young mother in her rental cottage, Tandi Jo Reese, finds herself charged with the task of cleaning out Iola’s rambling Victorian house.Running from a messy, dangerous past, Tandi never expects to find more than a temporary hiding place within Iola’s walls, but everything changes with the discovery of eighty-one carefully decorated prayer boxes, one for each year, spanning from Iola’s youth to her last days. Hidden in the boxes is the story of a lifetime, written on random bits of paper–the hopes and wishes, fears and thoughts of an unassuming but complex woman passing through the seasons of an extraordinary, unsung life filled with journeys of faith, observations on love, and one final lesson that could change everything for Tandi.
The Tidewater Sisters (2014)
Tandi Reese and her sister, Gina, have always been bound by complicated ties. Amid the rubble of a difficult childhood lie memories of huddling beneath beds and behind sofas while parental wars raged. Sisterhood was safety . . . once. But now? Faced with legal papers for a fraud she didn’t commit, Tandi suspects that her sister has done something unthinkable. With Tandi’s wedding just around the corner, a trip to the North Carolina Tidewater for a reckoning with Gina was not part of the plan. But unraveling lies from truth will require confronting strained sibling bonds and uncovering a dark family secret that could free Tandi from her past or stain her future forever.
The Story Keeper (2014)
Successful New York editor, Jen Gibbs, is at the top of her game with her new position at Vida House Publishing — until a mysterious manuscript from an old slush pile appears on her desk. Turning the pages, Jen finds herself drawn into the life of Sarra, a mixed-race Melungeon girl trapped by dangerous men in the turn of the century Appalachia. A risky hunch may lead to The Story Keeper’s hidden origins and its unknown author, but when the trail turns toward the heart of the Blue Ridge Mountains, a place Jen thought she’d left behind forever, the price of a blockbuster next book deal may be higher than she’s willing to pay.
The Sandcastle Sister (2015)
I want to be like this stretch of freshly cleared shore. At times I think, I’m ready. Let the waves wash over me. But then I catch myself running from the tide just before it happens . . .New York editor Jen Gibbs knew when she bought Evan Hall’s next blockbuster book, it would change her career. She didn’t know it would change her life. But after being sent along on the European book tour, at Evan’s request, she has made a promise she’s not sure she can keep–she’s crossed professional lines and accepted Evan’s surprising engagement proposal. Now she’s scared to death. In Jen’s family, marriage represents the death of every dream a woman holds for herself.Can the revelation of her mother’s long-held secret open the doors to Jen’s future and change her beliefs about life and love?
The Sea Keeper’s Daughters (2015)
From modern-day Roanoke Island to the sweeping backdrop of North Carolina’s Blue Ridge Mountains and Roosevelt’s WPA folklore writers, past and present intertwine to create an unexpected destiny.Restaurant owner Whitney Monroe is desperate to save her business from a hostile takeover. The inheritance of a decaying Gilded Age hotel on North Carolina’s Outer Banks may provide just the ray of hope she needs. But things at the Excelsior are more complicated than they seem. Whitney’s estranged stepfather is entrenched on the third floor, and the downstairs tenants are determined to save the historic building. Searching through years of stored family heirlooms may be Whitney’s only hope of quick cash, but will the discovery of an old necklace and a Depression-era love story change everything?
A Sandy’s Seashell Shop Christmas (2014)
A magical place, an island Christmas eve, a broken family in need of healing….For young military widow, Tiff Riley, Christmas isn’t just another day. It’s the worst of all days. Hiding out on Hatteras Island with three-and-a-half-year-old Micah, she’s desperate to once again ignore the anniversary of tragedy. The winter-season quiet of North Carolina’s Outer Banks is the perfect place to escape. It never feels like Christmas at the beach.But in tiny Hatteras Village, the crew at Sandy’s Seashell Shop is determined to make sure no one is forgotten at Christmas. Is it possible for a magical Christmas Eve at the Seashell Shop to help mend one damaged life? On a night of miracles, in a place of miracles, can a young widow’s heart be reopened to joy, hope… and even love?
Before We Were Yours (2016)
Memphis, 1939. Twelve-year-old Rill Foss and her four younger siblings live a magical life aboard their family’s Mississippi River shantyboat. But when their father must rush their mother to the hospital one stormy night, Rill is left in charge—until strangers arrive in force. Wrenched from all that is familiar and thrown into a Tennessee Children’s Home Society orphanage, the Foss children are assured that they will soon be returned to their parents—but they quickly realize the dark truth. At the mercy of the facility’s cruel director, Rill fights to keep her sisters and brother together in a world of danger and uncertainty.Aiken, South Carolina, present day. Born into wealth and privilege, Avery Stafford seems to have it all: a successful career as a federal prosecutor, a handsome fiancé, and a lavish wedding on the horizon. But when Avery returns home to help her father weather a health crisis, a chance encounter leaves her with uncomfortable questions and compels her to take a journey through her family’s long-hidden history, on a path that will ultimately lead either to devastation or to redemption.Based on one of America’s most notorious real-life scandals—in which Georgia Tann, director of a Memphis-based adoption organization, kidnapped and sold poor children to wealthy families all over the country—Lisa Wingate’s riveting, wrenching, and ultimately uplifting tale reminds us how, even though the paths we take can lead to many places, the heart never forgets where we belong.
The Book of Lost Friends (2020)
Louisiana, 1875: In the tumultuous era of Reconstruction, three young women set off as unwilling companions on a perilous quest: Hannie, a freed slave; Lavinia, the pampered heir to a now destitute plantation; and Juneau Jane, Lavinia’s Creole half sister. Each carries private wounds and powerful secrets as they head for Texas, following roads rife with vigilantes and soldiers still fighting a war lost a decade before. For Lavinia and Juneau Jane, the journey is one of stolen inheritance and financial desperation, but for Hannie, torn from her mother and siblings before slavery’s end, the pilgrimage west reignites an agonizing question: Could her long-lost family still be out there? Beyond the swamps lie the limitless frontiers of Texas and, improbably, hope.Louisiana, 1987: For first-year teacher Benedetta Silva, a subsidized job at a poor rural school seems like the ticket to canceling her hefty student debt—until she lands in a tiny, out-of-step Mississippi River town. Augustine, Louisiana, is suspicious of new ideas and new people, and Benny can scarcely comprehend the lives of her poverty-stricken students. But amid the gnarled live oaks and run-down plantation homes lie the century-old history of three young women, a long-ago journey, and a hidden book that could change everything.
Before and After (2019)
From the 1920s to 1950, Georgia Tann ran a black-market baby business at the Tennessee Children’s Home Society in Memphis. She offered up more than 5,000 orphans tailored to the wish lists of eager parents—hiding the fact that many weren’t orphans at all, but stolen sons and daughters of poor families, desperate single mothers, and women told in maternity wards that their babies had died.
