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Sonali Dev

Born:
Pen Name: None

Connection to Illinois: Dev lives in Naperville.

Biography: Sonali Dev is an award-winning author. Her first literary work was a play about mistaken identities performed at her neighborhood Diwali extravaganza in Mumbai. She was eight years old. Despite this early success, Sonali spent the next few decades getting degrees in architecture and written communication, migrating across the globe, and starting a family while writing for magazines and websites. She was also one of many contributors to the book, ''Scribbling Women and the Real-Life Romance Heroes Who Love Them.''


Awards:
  • '''''The Bollywood Affair'''''
  • -- NPR, Best Books, 2014
  • -- Library Journal, Best Books, 2014
  • '''''The Bollywood Bride'''''
  • -- Best Books of the Year, NPR, 2015
  • -- Best Books of the Year, Kirkus, 2015
  • -- Best Books, Washington Post, 2015
  • -- Fall Reading Selection, Amazon
  • -- Best Romances of the Month, Goodreads
  • -- International Dublin Literary Award Longlist
  • -- ILLINOIS READS Book Selection, Illinois Reading Council, 2017
  • '''''A Change of Heart'''''
  • -- Starred Review, Publishers Weekly
  • -- Starred Review, Booklist
  • -- Starred Review, Kirkus
  • -- Top Pick, RT Reviews

Primary Literary Genre(s): Fiction; Romance

Primary Audience(s): Adult readers

Blog: https://sonalidev.com/a-ha-moment-blog/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sonalidevfanpage
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Sonali_Dev
Website: https://sonalidev.com


Selected Titles

A Bollywood affair
ISBN: 9781496707871 OCLC: 835373961

Mili Rathod hasn't seen her husband in twenty years--not since she was promised to him at the age of four. Yet marriage has allowed Mili a freedom rarely given to girls in her village. Her grandmother has even allowed her to leave India and study in America for eight months, all to make her the perfect modern wife. Which is exactly what Mili longs to be--if her husband would just come and claim her. Bollywood's favorite director, Samir Rathod, has come to Michigan to secure a divorce for his older brother. Persuading a naïve village girl to sign the papers should be easy for someone with Samir's tabloid-famous charm. But Mili is neither a fool nor a gold-digger. Open-hearted yet complex, she's trying to reconcile her independence with cherished traditions. And before he can stop himself, Samir is immersed in Mili's life--cooking her dal and rotis, escorting her to her roommate's elaborate Indian wedding, and wondering where his loyalties and happiness lie.

A change of heart
ISBN: 9781496705747 OCLC: 934195314

Dr. Nikhil 'Nic' Joshi had it all-marriage, career, purpose. Until, while working for Doctors Without Borders in a Mumbai slum, his wife, Jen, discovered a black market organ transplant ring. Before she could expose the truth, Jen was killed. Two years after the tragedy, Nic is a cruise ship doctor who spends his days treating seasickness and sunburn and his nights in a boozy haze. On one of those blurry evenings on deck, Nic meets a woman who makes a startling claim- she received Jen's heart in a transplant and has a message for him. Nic wants to discount Jess Koirala's story as absurd, but there's something about her reckless desperation that resonates despite his doubts. Jess has spent years working her way out of a nightmarish life in Calcutta and into a respectable Bollywood dance troupe. Now she faces losing the one thing that matters-her young son, Joy. She needs to uncover the secrets Jen risked everything for; but the unforeseen bond that results between her and Nic is both a lifeline and a perilous complication. Delving beyond the surface of modern Indian-American life, acclaimed author Sonali Dev's page-turning novel is both riveting and emotionally rewarding-an extraordinary story of human connection, bravery, and hope.

A distant heart
ISBN: 9781496705761 OCLC: 981852489

Her name means miracle in Sanskrit: Kimaya was the first baby to survive after several miscarriages, and grew up in a mansion at the top of Mumbai's Pali Hill, surrounded by love and privilege. But at eleven years old, she develops a rare illness that requires her to be confined to a germ-free ivory tower in her home. Rahul Savant shows up to wash Kimi's windows, and as years pass he becomes her eyes to the outside world, and she becomes his inspiration to better himself. When a life-saving heart transplant offers the chance of a real future, Kimi anticipates a new life, and Rahul investigates a black market organ ring that cuts too close to home--Adapted from back cover.

INCENSE AND SENSIBILITY :
ISBN: 006305180X OCLC: 1199128666

Pride, prejudice, and other flavors :
ISBN: 0062839055 OCLC: 1089839619

"Award-winning author Sonali Dev launches a new series about the Rajes, an immigrant Indian family descended from royalty, who have built their lives in San Francisco."--

RECIPE FOR PERSUASION :
ISBN: 0062839071 OCLC: 1130668464

The Bollywood bride /
ISBN: 1617730157 OCLC: 921438652

Ria Parkar is Bollywood's favorite Ice Princess--beautiful, poised, and scandal-proof--until one impulsive act threatens to expose her destructive past. Traveling home to Chicago for her cousin's wedding offers a chance to diffuse the coming media storm and find solace in family, food, and outsized celebrations that are like one of her vibrant movies come to life. But it also means confronting Vikram Jathar. Ria and Vikram spent childhood summers together, a world away from Ria's exclusive boarding school in Mumbai. Their friendship grew seamlessly into love--until Ria made a shattering decision. As far as Vikram is concerned, Ria sold her soul for stardom and it's taken him years to rebuild his life. But beneath his pent-up anger, their bond remains unchanged. And now, among those who know her best, Ria may find the courage to face the secrets she's been guarding for everyone else's benefit--and a chance to stop acting and start living.

 

 

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