Contributor Review ~ The Sea Keeper's Daughters by Lisa Wingate

Wingate's third Carolina book follows the highly reviewed, The Prayer Box and The Story Keeper as well as related three novellas.

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  

Reviewed by Rebecca Maney

"A Masterful Blend of History and Story"

 

A shroud of mystery surrounds the mystic tri-racial Melungeons, thought by many to have descended from the historic "lost colony" of coastal North Carolina, making their elusive residence high in the Blue Ridge mountains and avoiding civilization, being the objects of cruel misconceptions and brutal treatment. Who would have the courage to trace their story, when it appears that their story might be safer kept untold?

Whitney Monroe is desperate, her once promising career in the restaurant business is on thin ice, having been intimidated by local Michigan residents who are resisting the high end competition that her eatery represents. As if life could not get any more complicated, she receives word that her estranged stepfather is in the hospital, miles away on Hatteras Island. Travelling to the Outer Banks takes Whitney on a much different journey that she could have ever anticipated when she begins to unearth family heirlooms with a connection to history that tangles her in a web of controversy over historical properties and personal preferences. Will her fear of love destroy everything that she is beginning to hold dear or will she trust the Keeper of the sea to ordain her steps as of one of His daughters; free to embrace a very promising future?

This novel is filled to over flowing with gems of inspiration and encouragement, not to mention the fascinating historical back story; connecting the narrative with the Federal Writers Program that was initiated by Eleanor Roosevelt during years of economic depression. "The Sea Keepers Daughters" is the kind of book that belongs on every shelf!

I am grateful to the publisher who provided me with an advance copy of this book in exchange for my honest opinion. 

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Rebecca is a graduate of Bryan College with a degree in Christian Education, and is currently serving at the First Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church in Gastonia, North Carolina as the Director of Children's Ministry. With nearly 28 years of experience in her field, she has had many opportunities to use her love of reading and writing in creative ways across the generations. A wife, mother of four "nearly" grown children, and grandmother to four beautiful grandchildren, Rebecca has been able to return to her love of reading and more recently reviewing, with a renewed passion for the "beauty of story".