Sara Sheridan

Books by Sara Sheridan

The Secret Mandarin

THE SECRET MANDARIN is a dramatic, involving story of love and loss set against the intriguing backdrop of nineteenth century China. 

Actress Mary Penney disgraces her respectable relations when she becomes pregnant. Her family’s attempts to pack her off to India for a new life are thwarted when she fails to board her ship. Desperate to remove her from English society, Mary’s pompous brother in law, husband of her much-loved sister, forces her to accompany him on his botanical expedition to China. On board he refuses to speak to her for the first month, and Mary is left alone to come to terms with her plight. The mission is difficult and dangerous – the novel is set at the time of the first Opium War, the British are regarded as enemies, and the export of tea bushes banned. Robert and Mary disguise themselves as a mandarin and man-servant, and Mary’s eyes are opened by the journey- she learns about plants, becomes fluent in Cantonese, empathises with the plight of Chinese peasants, and revels in the freedom afforded by her male identity. As the voyage continues into remote territory, so Robert and Mary’s relationship changes from antipathy to respect, and from friendship to love – but it’s an affair doomed from the start.

UK/Commonwealth rights: Avon HarperCollins
Spain: Ediciones B
Serbia: Alnari
Czech Republic: Levne Knihy KMa
Norway: Cappelem Dam
Pub date: October ‘09

Brighton Belle - historical crime series

The year is 1951. Mirabelle Bevan had a dramatic and exciting war working in intelligence; she and her married lover had been looking forward to a new life together in Brighton after the war, but her plans were in tatters when he died unexpectedly from a heart attack. The novel opens as Mirabelle, bereaved and alone, has a routine office job at a debt collector’s agency. However, when her boss goes missing and a Hungarian woman dies suspiciously, Mirabelle finds she’s again drawing on her wartime skills in surveillance and detection. And with the help of Vesta (the young black woman from the insurance office down the corridor) she uncovers a major money laundering scam involving Nazi gold.

Brighton Belle is the first in a planned series of twelve books running from 1951 to 1961 plus one prequel set in 1941/2.  The stories cover the development of Austerity Britain into the social and cultural explosion that took place in the early 1960s.  These developments are mirrored in Mirabelle Bevan’s personal life as she recovers from the horrors of WW2 and the tragic death of her lover, and gradually moves her life towards a more positive and happier outlook.

All rights available

I’m Imogen picture book for children

Sara’s first picture book is based on a game she played with her niece.

World rights: Chicken House
Pub date: Autumn 2010