Spotlight & Giveaway: The Lost Princess of St. Michel by Nancy Robards Thompson

Today it is my pleasure to Welcome author Nancy Robards Thompson to HJ!

Hi Nancy and welcome to HJ! We’re so excited to chat with you about your new release, The Lost Princess of St. Michel!

Hello, Everyone! I’m so excited to be here today.
 

Please summarize the book for the readers here:

Once Upon a Time… A struggling single mother discovered she was the heir to a Mediterranean kingdom. The problem was Sophie Baldwin didn’t believe in “happily ever after” anymore. She’d long outgrown the fantasy that a prince of a guy would swoop in and rescue her. She’d been making her own way in the world for a long time now. She didn’t need saving.
Then, a handsome stranger knocked on her door and whisked her away to an exotic kingdom.

Luc Lejardin had been dispatched to bring Sophie to St. Michel to take her proper place among the St. Michel royals. As next in line to the throne, she needed his protection 24/7. But watching over the reluctant princess was proving Luc’s most challenging mission. How could he keep his mind on business when all he wanted was pleasure in the princess’s arms?
But as long-buried family secrets start to surface, Sophie faces a choice: cling to her old life or take a leap of faith and claim her birthright. Could this Christmas bring her the happiness—and love—she’s been searching for?
 

Please share your favorite line(s) or quote from this book:

I enjoyed writing this book so much! But this one is toward the beginning of the book. Sophie’s parents and Luc, who is the head of St. Michel royal security and his agents, have converged on her house in North Carolina and broken the news to her that she is the heir to the throne and the king (the grandfather she never knew) has requested that she return to St. Michel. At first, she thinks it’s a joke or a scam. But as the reality that life as she always knew it was a lie – and that the people she believed were her parents had perpetuated this lie (though they were good and loving parents) she goes out onto her front porch (away from them) reveal Sophie’s true past, she goes outside to gather herself:

The first things she saw were the three Men in Black sitting on her porch in the freezing cold … which reinforced the fact that her parents weren’t her parents. She was the daughter of a dead princess and a deceased rock legend whose CDs were in her collection.

Please share a few Fun facts about this book…

This book has a thread of mystery in it, combining my two favorite genres: romance/women’s fiction and mystery. The kingdom of St. Michel is based on the principality of Monaco. Sophie’s hometown of Juniper Springs, North Carolina, is loosely based on Brevard, NC, with a lot of variations.

I always have a playlist for every book I write. Here’s the one for THE LOST PRINCESS OF ST. MICHEL:

• I Will Survive by Gloria Gaynor
• She’s So High by Tal Bachman
• Night by Ludovico Einaudi
• She’s A Rainbow by The Rolling Stones
• Goodbye Yellow Brick Road by Elton John
• Unforgettable by Natalie Cole.
• She’s Always A Woman by Billy Joel.
• Good Riddance (the time of your life) by Green Day
• Happier Than Ever by Billie Eilish
• Unstoppable by Sia

What first attracts your Hero to the Heroine and vice versa?

Luc loves love’s Sophie’s independent nature and he’s intrigued by how reluctant she us to being royal. Luc’s life has revolved around St. Michel’s royal family for as far back as he can remember and he’s met his share of hangers-on – including a secret faction that is looking to overthrow the throne. The fact it refreshing when Sophie is ambivalent about being part of the royal House of Founteneau.

Sophie is attracted to Luc because he keeps his word. Her ex-husband was so unreliable that when Luc proves to be solid and reliable, Sophie is moved.

Did any scene have you blushing, crying or laughing while writing it? And Why?

The scene where I introduced Sophie made me chuckle as I wrote it. Doesn’t everyone have a mental picture of themselves that may or may not (probably not) match that reflection that stops us as we catch a glimpse of ourselves in a window or mirror? I hope readers will find this scene and Sophie relatable.
Here’s the scene:

Sophie Baldwin could’ve lied to herself and sworn it was the dress in the window of Tina’s boutique that stopped her dead in her tracks on that cold, gray, late-November morning.
Right. As if she’d window shop in downtown Juniper Springs, North Carolina, when she had no extra money and was late for work again. Not to mention freezing, thanks to the arctic temperatures.
No. It wasn’t the dress that had stopped her.
As she walked, she’d glanced at her reflection, expecting to see the slim, attractive young woman who lived in her mind’s eye, but instead, the woman who smiled back at her made her stop and bite back a startled oath-
“What in the world.. .?” She moved closer for a better look. But it was no optical illusion. Bundled up in her big, canary-yellow wool coat, she resembled a life-sized squeeze bottle of FRENCH’S Classic Yellow Mustard.
It was startling, really, seeing herself like that. As she assessed the image, she realized it wasn’t just the coat that made her look dumpy. Her brown hair was flat and lank. Her green eyes were bloodshot and puffy. She looked haggard, worried and miserable. Much too old and tired for thirty-three.

Readers should read this book….

…because it’s a fun, feel-good story that just might make you believe in fairy tales again.

What are you currently working on? What other releases do you have in the works?

I am just finishing a book for the Harlequin Fortunes of Texas series. Then I will start another cozy mystery. I’ll have at least five releases out in 2025: Four more books in the St. Michel series: THE LONG WAY HOME; THE ONE WHO GOT AWAY; THE ART OF STARTING OVER; THE PROMISE OF PROVENCE. The Fortunes of Texas book I mentioned above will be available in October 2025.
 

Thanks for blogging at HJ!

Giveaway: I’ll give one lucky winner a Kindle copy of THE LOST PRINCESS OF ST. MICHEL and an e-copy of SLAY BELLS RING, the first book in my Wedding Bell Mysteries cozy mystery series (which has been optioned for television).

To enter Giveaway: Please complete the Rafflecopter form and Post a comment to this Q: What would you do if you found out you were a royal? Would you embrace it or shun it?

 
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Excerpt from The Lost Princess of St. Michel:

Prologue

Once upon a time in the days of old (1985), in a kingdom far, far away (an independent island off the coast of France), there was a very naughty teenage princesse who had a penchant for very bad boys. She fell in love with a wild rock star and became pregnant out of wedlock. Before the princesse told the rock star of her situation, she entrusted the news to her chambermaid, who promptly informed the queen, who in turn informed the king.

The king was furious because he did not think the rock star suitable for his royal daughter. To avoid a scandal, the king sent the princesse away against her will to have the baby in secret. Immediately after the birth, the baby was secreted away. Only the king knew the whereabouts of the child.

Something inside the princesse changed after giving birth. Haunted by the baby girl she’d never held, she vowed she would get her baby back. When she was free of her father’s imprisonment, she reached out to her beloved rock star, who had been devastated by her sudden disappearance. During the time without her, he, too, had changed his wild ways because he knew that the princesse was his one true love. He was overcome with a mixture of joy and sadness when he learned of the baby and how the child was taken from his beloved. He immediately dropped down on one knee and vowed to make the young princesse his bride and reunite their small family.

However, on the dark and stormy night when the princesse and the rock star set out to start their life together, there was a terrible accident. The plane in which they were flying crashed, and much to everyone’s sadness, the princesse and the rock star perished in the disaster before they could reclaim their child.

Chapter One

“Is everything in place?” Luc Lejardin rose from his antique desk and paced the length of the wooden floor to the arched office window. Expecting an affirmative, he watched the setting sun cast an impressionistic glow over the Mediterranean Sea, reflecting the colored lights of St. Michel as brilliant as the crown jewels.

The American on the other end of the line hesitated a split second too long. “Not quite. I’m close, though.”

Lejardin frowned. Most wouldn’t have picked up on the nearly imperceptible uncertainty in the speaker’s voice. But Luc had. It was his job to detect lies, disloyalty, duplicity. He liked to think of himself as a human polygraph.

He trusted no one. Especially now when, for the sake of national security, everything must go without a hitch. There was no room for error on this mission. Not in the wake of the tragedy.
A tragedy he had failed to prevent.

“I’m not pleased, monsieur,” Lejardin snapped. “We arrive stateside in less than ten hours. I trust you will have completed your job before we board the plane. If there is a problem, I will assign someone more capable. We cannot afford any mistakes.”

“There is no problem,” the contact said. “I’ll e-mail the last of the photos to you within the hour.”
Luc terminated the call and tucked his phone into the breast pocket of his Armani suit. Underneath the fine fabric, his heart felt leaden. He leaned against the wooden window frame and closed his eyes out of respect for the grieving king and those who’d lost their lives.

The tragic fire that killed Prince Antoine and his family had happened under Luc’s watch. Not directly, as Prince Antoine had his own team of Royal Service Agents – agents who worked for Lejardin.

Those men had perished in the fire, too.

As minister of protocol, the blood of those who died would forever remain on Luc’s hands. It was something for which he would never forgive himself, despite how King Bertrand insisted there was no way Lejardin could’ve prevented it.

Refusing to believe that someone was responsible for the tragedy that had stolen what remained of his family, the king clung hard and fast to the belief that the House of Founteneau was cursed. Sometimes, Lejardin’s most challenging job was protecting the king from himself.
Then the curse had struck again.

Ah, but Luc knew better. He was too much of a realist to believe in curses or anything so far beyond his control.

A murderer was behind this tragedy-and most certainly the other fatalities that had happened one by one over the past thirty-three years. Each death had been carefully orchestrated to look like an accident. Someone had taken enough care so that even the Crown Council and Luc’s father, who had been minister of protocol until the day he died three years ago and Luc had stepped up to the post, had ruled each of the tragedies an accident.

With this “accident,” every one of King Bertrand’s children, every known Founteneau heir to the St. Michel throne, was dead – each perishing in separate but equally tragic “accidents.”

That one family would endure so much loss was almost unfathomable. Whether he had the king and the Crown Council behind him or not, Luc would not rest until the responsible parties paid for the innocent lives they’d taken.

In the meantime, though, he had other pressing business: ensuring the safety of the only remaining heir to the St. Michel throne. An heir who, until yesterday, nobody except King Bertrand knew existed.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
 
 

Book Info:

All Sophie Baldwin wants for Christmas is a little happiness. But with an uncooperative ex-husband, a daughter who resents her, and a job she can’t stand, it feels like all she’s getting this year is coal.

When a charming stranger arrives with the shocking news that Sophie is the heir to a small Mediterranean kingdom, she thinks it’s just another holiday scam. But as long-buried family secrets start to surface, Sophie faces a choice: cling to her old life or take a leap of faith and claim her birthright. Could this Christmas bring her the happiness—and love—she’s been searching for?
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Meet the Author:

USA Today Bestselling author Nancy Robards Thompson writes cozy mysteries, romance, and women’s fiction. Once, she worked as a newspaper reporter covering government, tourism, and business, but soon discovered reporting “just the facts” was boring. Happier to report to her muse, Nancy has sold more than 50 books to five traditional publishers and is exploring independent publishing. Her work, which critics have deemed “…funny, smart, and observant,” has sold in 22 countries and been translated into 12 languages. She lives in Tennessee with her husband and their corgi, Luna.

For more information:

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