Sandra Sookoo is a USA Today bestselling author who firmly believes every person deserves acceptance and a happy ending. That is why her characters are not in the usual style and oftentimes struggle with things out of the norm. She’s written for publication since 2008. Most days you can find her creating scandal and mischief in the Regency-era, serendipity and happenstance in the Victorian era, or historical romantic suspense complete with mystery and intrigue. Reading is a lot like eating chocolates—you can’t just have one book. Give her the chance with one book and you’ll be hooked.
When she’s not wearing out computer keyboards or mice, Sandra spends time with her real-life Prince Charming in Central Indiana where she also runs a gourmet cookie business and makes moments count with the man because the key to life is laughter. Inspired to storytelling by Walt Disney since the age of ten, when her soul gets bogged down and her imagination flags, a trip to Walt Disney World is in order. Nothing fills the well and fuels her dreams more than the land of eternal happy endings, hope and love stories.
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Title: A Ghostly Affair (Diamonds of London #7)
Author: Sandra Sookoo
Genre: Historical romance, Regency romance
Book Blurb:
When a lady has failed to find love in the usual ways, she will turn to the paranormal…
American Miss Arabella Tamsyn Goodridge has never belonged anywhere, but when one of her British cousins wishes for her to be a part of her upcoming nuptial ceremony ahead of the All Hallow’s celebrations, she jumps at the chance, especially when they’re staying in haunted Coventry Castle, set close to the Scottish Highlands. She has always believed in ghosts and ghouls, yet she’s dismally practical, except when it comes to falling in love with the resident spirit… apparently.
Percival Allan Bradenton—Marquess of Coventry—and half Scottish on his father’s side, has been missing and presumed dead for two years. Without a body, his uncle can’t legally claim the title, but Allan refuses to come out of hiding until he can figure out who wishes to kill him. To stave off boredom as well as look for clues, he haunts his family’s castle in the countryside in the Highlands, until one night when he stumbles into a woman who turns his head and changes his life… exceptionally.
With her knowledge of herbal remedies and ease in bonding with animals, Bella is often slandered as a witch, but when she comes upon a man who should be dead and desire flares, she partners with him in solving a mystery. With a plot afoot to keep Allan from his birthright, danger bedevils them. As Halloween and the wedding quickly approaches, she and Allan strive to keep him alive, and unless they’re fortunate in flushing out the guilty party in theatrical fashion, they’ll never have a chance for a romance they never knew they needed… eternally.
… for there is no use for a societal reputation when a delicious ghost is involved.
Excerpt
“Since, by your own admission, you don’t plan to forget what you’ve seen here, we now have a problem,” he countered as if she hadn’t asked a question.
“Again, I shall ask why?”
A muscle in his cheek ticced, or rather she assumed it did as she could only see subtle movement beneath the several days’ growth of stubble that clung to his face and jaw. That beard, so hated by society matrons everywhere, fascinated her. “Because, I am a ghost.”
“I somehow doubt that. Ghosts don’t exist… I think. Which means you have snuck into the castle and are a vagrant, possibly an ex-solider judging by the fact your form isn’t flabby, nor do you have a paunch as so many men do.” Indeed, he was quite a handsome intruder with a barrel chest, wide shoulders, and a rugged jawline beneath that beard that could fire many a woman’s fantasy.
Another round of heat infused her cheeks.
“I never served in the military.” With every word, the warmth of his breath skated over her cheek, he was that close, maneuvered around her so that he was between her and the room.
“Ah.” Ghosts didn’t need to draw breath or exhale. “So then?” She glanced up into his face. The eyes were slightly familiar to her, but why? Never had she met this man. “Who are you and why are you here?”
“I cannae tell you.”
“Hmm.” An interesting development, and that burr awoke butterflies in her lower belly she assumed she would never experience again.
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Title: Dreaming of a Lyon
Author: Sandra Sookoo
Genre: Historical romance, Regency romance
Publisher: Dragonblade Publishing
Book Blurb:
When a Lyon is restless, Mrs. Dove-Lyon is on notice…
In search of excitement… Though Captain Simon Henry Huxley lost an eye in the naval war with America in 1812, it hasn’t slowed him down the past six years. Since his contemporaries are falling into parson’s mousetrap with alarming regularity—manipulated by Mrs. Dove-Lyon no doubt—and with yearning to return to the sea thrumming through his veins, London is a bit dull. But after a spontaneous visit to the infamous Lyon’s Den gaming hell one winter night, his life will change in every conceivable way.
Dreaming of freedom… Lady Hattie Anne Russell, youngest daughter to the Earl of Stonewycke, has been intimate with scandal since the day she turned sixteen. She dislikes rules, labels, or the ton’s boring dictates for proper ladies, and through it all she’s been bedeviled by dreams of an adventurous lion. Frustrated, her mother turns to Mrs. Dove-Lyon for help in marrying Hattie off before further disgrace follows; no stake is too high, and any Lyon will do, but Hattie won’t be tamed, and neither will she submit to marriage without a fight.
A matchmaker’s interference may provide both… After a hasty marriage of convenience, the newly wedded pair is forced to make the best of their reality. As the calendar marches toward spring, the two accidentally find common ground by bonding over the silliest of things. Secrets and dreams are shared, and emotions prompt surprising heat between them, yet an unexpected complication has the power to destroy what they’re building. It will take daring heroics and exceptional mettle to prove they are worthy of a love—and a life—for the ages.
…which goes to prove, once again, the owner of the Lyon’s Den is never wrong.
Excerpt
“If you force marriage upon me, I can all but guarantee scandal will follow, and in ways you have never considered before.”
Remarkably, Mrs. Dove-Lyon chuckled, and it was a rather pleasant sound. “Ah, good, your daughter is spirited, Janice. That will make things a bit easier, for she’ll require handling by someone who is used to taking command.”
“As if I’m a dog to be brought to heel?” The more the other women discussed her life as if she wasn’t there or had no recourse, the more annoyed she grew.
“Having a strong husband in all the ways that matters isn’t a necessarily horrid thing, my dear, and this match will be entertaining, at least for me.” The two older women nodded in unison. “Now, to the meat of the matter. In exchange for said matchmaking, there is a cost.”
It was her mother’s turn to seem ill-at-ease. “Stonewycke has put a large dowry on her head. Shouldn’t that prove enough to attract someone?”
“Yes, of course, but I meant there is a cost I demand. My services don’t come cheap, as you know.”
“I do.” Her mother nodded with an odd expression on her face that made Hattie wonder just how intimately she knew this Mrs. Dove-Lyon. “What is it?”
The gaming hell’s owner’s lips curved into the cat’s own grin. “I require your daughter to wed Captain Huxley immediately.”
Both her mother and Hattie gasped, even as she said his name over and over in her mind, for she had no idea who this captain was.
“You wish for my daughter to marry a man she hasn’t met, let alone seen?”
Mrs. Dove-Lyon chuckled again as she clasped her hands in her lap. “That is an interesting choice of words, for he is missing an eye.”
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Title: Autumn Means Marriage… and Murder
Author: Sandra Sookoo
Genre: Historical romance, Regency romance
Book Blurb:
It’s a bad omen to find a corpse on the eve of a wedding… unless it was fate’s plan all along.
Autumn has arrived in England and so has Mary Tomlinson’s long-awaited wedding day to her handsome former Bow Street inspector. Though her newfound happiness frightens her—she’s had ill-fortune with men in the past—she’s looking forward to what her future will bring, for assisting in solving crimes is quite invigorating, especially when mixing business with heady trysts of pleasure.
After retiring from his position at Whitehall, on the eve of Inspector Gabriel Bright’s wedding to the intriguing Mary, he attends the opera with her for no other reason than to treat her to her favorite play. Despite their obstacle-strewn path to romance, he’s anticipating wedding—and bedding—the attractive woman and being a husband again as well as making their oftentimes hotly passionate relationship legitimate.
Yet when they stumble over a dead body in a shadowy corridor at the opera house, the course of those plans is thrown into jeopardy, for the dead woman had been a paramour of her former husband’s. As tension brews between Mary and Bright, their investigation takes them to Brighton and plunges them into a secret pleasure spa. The distractions prove harrowing and dangerous to them both, and unless they solve the case, there will be nothing left of the relationship to warrant a union.
Excerpt
The corridors were dimly lit with guttering gas lamps on the wall. Some of the halls were crowded with people either wishing to stretch their legs or heading out to seek punch or champagne. When they encountered a few acquaintances, they either nodded or paused briefly to greet them.
“Come, Mrs. Tomlinson.” Gabriel tugged on her hand until they’d found a short corridor that led to what seemed to be a backstage area on the second level. “Surely there are hiding places through here.”
None of that was to be, for near the door lay the body of a woman lay with a pool of dark blood beside her. She lay on her side with one arm flung up over her head.
Mary gasped. “Gabriel!” Her hissed whisper sounded overly loud of the sudden quiet of the space.
“Dear God,” he said as he gazed down at the body. Quickly. There might be a possibility she’s still alive.” Wasting no time, he kneeled on her other side to avoid the blood.
“I rather doubt she is.” Her utterance was quite choked whisper, for the bottom dropped out of her stomach. The longer she peered at the body, the more apprehension gathered about her person. She knew the woman, and what was more, the jeweled handle of a letter opener—her letter opener—stuck out from the woman’s chest. Blood stained the front of the woman’s gown in mustard-colored silk.
While Bright removed his gloves and then checked for vital signs, Mary bit her bottom lip as cold foreboding played icy fingers up and down her spine. The woman who lay on the floor, the woman who’d lost her life in a violent manner, had, at one time, been a mistress of her first husband.
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