The Heart-Wrenching Tale Behind a Blockbuster Bestseller: Lisa Wingate’s “Before We Were Yours”
With over two million copies sold and accolades from The New York Times to Publishers Weekly, Lisa Wingate’s Before We Were Yours has captured the hearts and minds of readers across the globe. This poignant and engrossing historical novel transports us to Memphis in 1939, where twelve-year-old Rill Foss and her siblings live a carefree life aboard their family’s shantyboat. But that innocence is shattered when the children are torn from their home and thrust into the sinister Tennessee Children’s Home Society, a notorious orphanage run by Georgia Tann. What follows is a harrowing fight for survival as Rill struggles to keep her family together in the face of cruelty and deception.
In a parallel story set in modern-day South Carolina, we meet Avery Stafford, a woman born into privilege, grappling with a family secret that could upend everything she knows. A chance discovery during a visit to her ailing father leads Avery on a path of uncovering hidden truths, intertwining her life with the long-buried past of the Foss family. As Avery delves deeper into her family’s history, she uncovers devastating secrets about a scandalous chapter in America’s past—the kidnapping and selling of poor children to wealthy families by Georgia Tann’s adoption empire.
Lisa Wingate masterfully weaves together these two timelines, crafting a powerful narrative that brings to light one of America’s darkest real-life scandals. Before We Were Yours is not just a tale of heartbreak and loss but also one of resilience, love, and the unbreakable bonds of family. It serves as a reminder that, no matter how far we stray from where we began, the heart remembers its true home.
