Lea Wait Books in Order

At a prestigious antiques fair, print dealer Maggie Summer brushes off rumors about suspicious deaths until murder hits close to home. To protect friends and her business, she has to read the dealers around her as carefully as the prints on display.

In 1805 Charleston, enslaved boy Michael Lautrec works on the docks and dreams of the sea. When his protector dies, he must choose between staying safe and risking everything on a dangerous run toward freedom.

Maggie heads to coastal Maine to help old friends settling into a centuries-old house, only to find family secrets, ghostly rumors, and a murdered local girl. The case forces her to untangle the tangled histories of the house and the people drawn to it.

In 1806 Wiscasset, eleven-year-old Abbie Chambers and her little brother are left alone after their mother dies in a smallpox epidemic and their father is feared lost at sea. Abbie takes work as a housemaid and fights to build a new home for them both.

While teaching at a New Jersey college, Maggie advises a dorm for single parents and sees firsthand how hard-won those families are. When one young mother is poisoned, Maggie finds the past and present colliding in dangerous ways.

After the Panic of 1837 ruins his family, twelve-year-old Jake Webber is uprooted from Boston to a harsher life in Wiscasset, Maine. With winter closing in and family secrets pressing hard, he has to learn resilience fast.

Maggie agrees to run an antiques show benefiting an adoption agency, but threatening letters and calls turn the event into a nightmare. To keep the show, and the people behind it, safe, she has to uncover who wants it stopped.

In 1820 Maine, Will loses a leg in a farm accident just as he expects to start adult work. As he and his sister Cassie struggle to find new roles in a changing state, both must imagine futures they never planned.

Co-written with Lesley Bolton, this practical guide walks writers through the children's book world, from shaping ideas and understanding age groups to revising, submitting, and navigating publication. It is a clear, useful starting point for new writers.

Visiting Waymouth, Maine, Maggie gets drawn into the mystery of an 1890 diary linked to Winslow Homer and a newly murdered woman. Small-town loyalties and old secrets make the hunt for the truth especially dangerous.

On Cape Cod to help her friend Gussie prepare for a wedding, Maggie instead gets pulled into a death on the beach and a man with two identities. Between family tension and stormy weather, the weekend turns deadly.

Maggie spends Christmas in Waymouth hoping to sort out her future with Will, but festive gatherings soon uncover buried resentments and homicide. Holiday cheer gives way to a case rooted in old secrets.

In April 1861, thirteen-year-old Joe Wood is trying to keep his Wiscasset newspaper afloat as the Civil War begins. As war tensions reach Maine, he juggles business, friendship, race, and a disappearance that turns urgent.

A warm collection of essays about Maine seasons, an old house, marriage, and the practical side of being an author. Wait mixes memoir, humor, and writing-life reflections with a strong sense of place.

In this short prequel, young Michael Lautrec searches Charleston's streets and wharves for his father as a devastating hurricane bears down. The storm changes his family and sets up the path of Seaward Born.

During a Fourth of July gathering, Angie and the Mainely Needlepointers examine a possibly medieval piece of embroidery. When the heirloom disappears from a lawyer's safe and the lawyer ends up dead, Angie has to follow the threads backward through time.

A decaying Victorian house, a long-ago death, and a Hollywood actress with plans for Haven Harbor pull Angie into another puzzle. The deeper she digs into the house and its needlework, the more the past refuses to stay buried.

After ten years away, Angie Curtis returns to Haven Harbor when her long-missing mother's body is found. Then a man tied to her grandmother's needlepoint business is murdered, and Angie realizes the town's old secrets are not finished with her.

When developers target a hermit's island bird sanctuary, Angie and her friends rally to help him save his land. Then he turns up dead, and the fight over the island becomes a murder investigation.

Maggie takes a sabbatical, moves to Maine, and hopes finally to adopt the daughter she wants, but nothing goes smoothly. Harbor seal shootings and the murder of a young fisherman shake her new life before it can settle.

Fourteen-year-old future chef Mikki Norden is already dealing with family upheaval when her mentor, restaurateur Mr. Baldacci, dies suddenly. Convinced it was no heart attack, she starts digging into restaurant secrets, and family ones too.

Christmas in Haven Harbor gets crowded when movie star Skye West descends on town with guests and demands. After a sudden death and a possible poisoning, Angie has to solve the case before the holidays unravel completely.

Angie's closest friend, antiques dealer Sarah Byrne, has kept much of her past hidden, until a family reunion brings everything to the surface. When the gathering ends in murder, Angie must figure out which secret proved fatal.

Set in 1777, this historical novel follows Scottish immigrant siblings Rory and Sarah Campbell as the Revolution reaches Maine and New York. Separated by war and duty, they each find unexpected ways to matter.

On Quarry Island, Anna Winslow's life is upended by the discovery of a younger sister and the death of her brother-in-law on a drifting lobster boat. As Anna and Izzie investigate, family history and island loyalties turn the case personal.

In 1848 Edinburgh, a Highland family pushed off its land struggles to survive in the city. Fifteen-year-old Meggie, twelve-year-old Rab, and little Kirstie face hunger, hard work, and the stubborn hope of staying together.

At an estate sale, Angie buys an old coat of arms and discovers a foundling hospital document hidden behind it. The historical clue draws threats, then murder, and Angie has to learn why someone wants baby Charles forgotten.

In April 1865, wounded Civil War veteran Aaron Stone travels to upstate New York hoping for rest, but instead finds a body exposed by floodwaters and a woman accused of murder. His search for truth draws him into a hidden network protecting abused women.

A movie shoot brings excitement to Haven Harbor, where Angie and Sarah help with set design for a story rooted in an old local tragedy. When the producer is killed, the town's past and present start pointing toward the same danger.

Haven Harbor looks after its own, which makes the murder of bottle collector Ike Hamilton especially shocking. When suspicion falls on a troubled teenage boy, Angie traces Ike's daily rounds and finds he knew far more than people guessed.