Wells was born in Louisiana in 1952.

After college, she moved to New York City to pursue her acting career and began studying Stanislavski's system of acting, and a depth approach that integrates spirituality and performance, with Maurine Holbert.

"I live in an actor's body, in which the cultivation of sense memory, active listening, and the belief that the sublime can arise out of the most common character, word, or gesture is somewhat of a religion for me."

Charmed by the beauty and grace of the Pacific Northwest, she decided to make Seattle, Washington her home, and currently lives on Bainbridge Island. There she began to perform and develop plays at numerous Seattle theaters.

Her current works are set in Louisiana. While many fans assume her writing is autobiographical (since the protagonist of Divine Secrets is a play director like her), Wells says, "My work is a result of my imagination dancing a kind of psycho-spiritual tango with my own history, and the final harvest is fiction, not memoir."

Her first novel, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood, became a #1 New York Times bestseller and a publishing phenomenon several years before being made into a movie starring Sandra Bullock in 2002. It won the 1999 Adult Trade ABBY Award and inspired Ya-Ya clubs all over the world.

She followed this with a collection of short stories, Little Altars Everywhere, a prequel to Divine Secrets, which won the Western States Book Award, became an underground bestseller, supported by independent bookstores nation-wide before becoming a New York Times bestseller.

Her second novel, another Divine Secrets prequel Ya-Yas in Bloom with more information about the early lives of the Ya-Ya Sisters, also became a New York Times bestseller.

The Crowning Glory of Calla Lily Ponder introduced a wholly new set of characters and Louisiana settings.

Her four bestselling novels have given Wells a dominant place in American literature.

Wells is committed to peace and social justice. Having performed as an actress in regional theaters across the country, and having helped organize a major march for nuclear disarmament, she visited Seattle. There, she founded a chapter of Performing Artists for Nuclear Disarmament.