This week’s Inheritance Books are from Toni Sands, who is a fellow RNA member.

Hi Toni, welcome to Inheritance Books. Tell us a bit about yourself.

I enjoyed a boringly happy childhood in the Vale of Glamorgan. There were many hours of fun on the nearby beaches and I also spent time hand writing my own magazines, creating secret worlds and improbable characters. A secretarial course proved a springboard to jobs in hotels and in aviation as an airline receptionist and airhostess. Back on the ground I became a PA, then a wife and mother while running a guesthouse with my husband in a ‘chocolate box’ Wiltshire village. The writing bug struck again and some of my short stories were broadcast on BBC local radio. After being widowed then moving to mid Wales in December 2000, I began submitting stories to women’s magazines while also working as a minute taker. This was when I followed the advice of a famous author and wrote my first erotic romances! These stories, novellas and one novel are published by Xcite Books.

But there are two sides to me – the winceyette nightie and cocoa one as opposed to the black satin and bubbly side! I have two contemporary romances under consideration by publishers and have just had a WW2 sweet romance accepted as a D C Thomson pocket novel.

I love visiting the theatre, especially for a good musical or absorbing drama. Obviously reading is still important to me, including keeping up with my friends’ novels. They’re all such good writers, dang it! I enjoy cooking supper while listening to the radio and maybe with a glass of wine to hand. The Welsh countryside is perfect for walking in and that’s when I do a lot of my thinking. Sometimes I can hear my characters talking to one another and have to hurry home to write down the dialogue.

Which book have you inherited from generations above? Why is it special?

The Children of Wilton Chase, by L T Meade, was presented to my late mother as a prize for being an excellent school pupil. Mum didn’t have many books of her own, preferring to use the public library, so this one’s very precious to me. It has a real old school cover too.
Which book would you like to leave to future generations? Why?

Well this is extremely challenging! Sadly, my childhood set of Golden Pathway hardbacks must have vanished during one of our moves. These books provided a feast of information, fiction and fabulous pictures. I’m afraid of choosing one of my favourite novels for fear future generations might consider it yawn-inducing and my ghost would have to come back and haunt them. Food will always be a great leveller so I’m choosing a cookbook. No, it’s not by Nigella or Jamie or any other celebrity chef. I’m selecting ‘Tasty Dishes’ which belonged to my mother in law and which cost one shilling. Future generations will find that coin about as relevant to them as a groat is to us but the recipes are a delight. We’re talking one hundred year old instructions here and the dishes have great names like Palestine Soup, Camp Pie and Agra Pudding. On a literary note, the book catalogue included at the end of ‘Tasty Dishes’ makes fascinating reading. So a slice of social history to send into the future then!

It makes a nice change having a cookbook as an Inheritance Book. I like the idea. It sounds like a fascinating book too. Great choice!

Toni’s historical erotic romance, Orchid Pink, is available for pre-order in paperback form from Xcite Books. Or for your Kindle from Amazon UK. You can learn more about Toni on her website (www.tonisands.co.uk), or you can follow her on Twitter (@tonisands) or find her on Facebook