[1] Sarah de Almeida was born on November 18, 1962, in the village of Granja, Águas Santas, Maia[2][3] and grew up in Porto, Portugal.
[4] Educated in both Portugal and the United States, she graduated from University of Porto, with a Master's equivalent in Modern Languages and Literatures with a major in English and a minor in German.
[11] Her favorite genre, however, remains science fiction,[12] and Hoyt is a prolific writer.
Her short stories are in Analog, Asimov's, Weird Tales, and anthologies from DAW and Baen.
[13] Her shapeshifter series[14] include Draw One in the Dark and Gentleman Takes a Chance, urban fantasy adventures,[15] from Baen Books.
Under the house name Laurien Gardner, she has Plain Jane for Jove Books Historical Fiction.
[18] A review in Locus[19] described it as "filled with not only slambang adventures but also a kind of rational optimism... rare in genre works these days."