Spotlight & Giveaway: Cruel Money by K.A. Linde

Today it is my pleasure to Welcome author K.A. Linde to HJ!

Hi K A and welcome to HJ! We’re so excited to chat with you about your new release, Cruel Money!

Please summarize the book for the readers here:

Cruel Money is about a couple, Penn and Natalie, that met six years earlier in Paris and had a one night stand. Then Natalie takes a job as a vacation home watcher for a wealthy family in the Hamptons and it turns out to be Penn’s home. She didn’t know his last name when she first met him and now they are together again for the fall while the house is being renovated while she writes her literary novel and he is on sabbatical from his job as a philosophy professor. Now he wants her back.
 

Please share the opening lines of this book:

Dear Natalie,

Here are the latest rejection letters from publishers regarding TOLD YOU SO. I will follow up with a list from Caroline of the remaining publishers who have the manuscript out on submission.

Regards,

Meredith Mayberry
Assistant to Caroline Liebermann
Whitten, Jones, & Liebermann Literary

Please share a few Fun facts about this book…

• I went to Paris and New York City to do research for this series.
• This book draws inspiration from one of my favorite novels, The Dangerous Liaisons.
• I have a degree in philosophy and this is the first time I’ve ever written someone else who is a philosopher.

Please tell us a little about the characters in your book. As you wrote your protagonist was there anything about them that surprised you?

Natalie is stubborn, strong-willed, a grudge-holder, and fiercely loyal. She has long silver-white hair and wears bohemian clothes. She’s also a bit of a new age freak. Though she acts like she doesn’t want to be because her mom owns an apothecary shop. She grew up a military brat, but her father retired in Charleston and so vacation home watching gives her that same sense of travel and adventure while having the security of roots back home. I think what really surprised me about Natalie is how much she ended up being like me. All of my heroines are a part of me, but when I was writing Natalie, I didn’t think she was like me until I went back and saw myself in her. And I hope all the readers find themselves in her too.

Penn is an Upper East Side playboy who wars with that side of his personality. He has a PhD in philosophy from Harvard and now works as an assistant professor at Columbia. He teaches ethics and has struggles with his own morals and the life he chooses to lead and tries to escape. He’s arrogant, charming, quick witted, and thoughtful. He thinks deeply about things and when he and Natalie collide again, he’s explosive. Finding himself in her and each other. I think the most surprising thing about Penn was that he’s this strong, alpha, intelligent being, who also has a soft spot under it all. A bleeding heart with a core of gold that really endears himself to Natalie.

If your book was optioned for a movie, what scene would you use for the audition of the main characters and why?

I think what I would share is the first time that Penn and Natalie are alone after they encounter each other at the beach house. He’s there with friends for the weekend before staying longer and Natalie is a wildfire while he’s trying to soothe her worries. But she’s having none of it.

Penn stepped through the open door, and my breath caught. He’d removed his suit coat and his black tie. The white button-up underneath was undone on the first two buttons, and it fit him as if it had been made for him. Broad shoulders that narrowed down to his trim waist and those incredible legs.
I admonished myself with an imaginary smack in the face and met his cool blue gaze. “Can I help you?”
He leaned against the open doorframe and slid a hand into his pocket. Habit maybe. “I came to check on you.”
“Why?”
“I wanted to make sure that you were all right.” His eyes moved to the open suitcase on the bed and the mess of clothes between it and the drawer. He straightened. The only sign that my packing had taken him by surprise. “Are you leaving?”
“Yeah. I’m just packing now, and I’ll be out of your hair by the morning.”
“That was not what I meant.”
“Well, why don’t you say what you mean?” For once, was the implied addition. “I’m kind of busy.”
“You don’t have to leave.”
“Of course I do. This is your house. I was hired to watch and maintain an empty house for the season before some big party in November. Not only is the house not empty, but I also assume I’ll be fired by Monday. So, I might as well get started.” I stuffed another shirt into the suitcase to make a point.
“Why on earth would you get fired?”
I released an exasperated breath. “Lark hired me. After that performance, I can’t imagine her reporting back kindly.”
“Lark…isn’t going to report back to my mother.”
Now, I turned to him fully. My own surprise clear. “Why ever not?”
“This is actually her first real vacation in three years. She got the weekend off from the office, and I dragged her here with the others after her last event.” He gestured to his suit as if to say, Hence the outfit. “The fact that it slipped her mind that you were here is a testament to how much she needs it. So, you can imagine work is the last thing on her mind.”
I couldn’t imagine. Her life sounded horrible. Who didn’t take any time off for three years? What kind of slave driver was Mayor Kensington?
“But,” he continued when I didn’t respond immediately, “we can get out of your hair. Head back to the city or something. So see, you should stay. And we’ll go.”
“No, that’s absurd. This is your house. I’m the interloper here. Even if Lark doesn’t report me, which I’m still doubting, I would get in the way. There’s no reason for me to be here if you’re here.”
“But it’s your job. None of us”—he paused on the word us, as if contemplating whether what he was about to say was true—“wants to take that from you. So, you should stay.”
“I’m already halfway packed.”
“Natalie,” he said softly.
He stepped forward into the room and placed his hand on one of the posters of the bed. His gaze softened and bore into mine. I was transfixed once more. The way he said my name. The way he stared at me. Oh god, he was such a menace.
“Don’t,” I snapped.
His eyebrows rose in response.
“Don’t say my name like you know me or even care whether I stay or go. We don’t know each other. And I’m certain I don’t want to know you.”
It was harsh but honest. And I didn’t feel bad, saying it.
“Fine,” he finally muttered on a sigh. “We’ll figure it out in the morning once you’ve cooled off.”
“I don’t need to cool off,” I bit out. “I’m perfectly levelheaded.”
“Just stay,” he barked.
“No, I think I should go.”
He walked back to the door. “Do whatever you want, I guess. I came to check to make sure that you weren’t humiliated after what happened. But it seems that your pride is too great to even continue staying under the same roof as us. You don’t have to stay,” he said, glancing back at me. “But, if you do, try to stay out of the way.”

What do you want people to take away from reading this book?

Love is twisty. It doesn’t always happen the way you want. Sometimes it explodes out of the most unexpected person. The person that just shouldn’t fit. But does anyway. And it is messy and hard and sometimes just impossible. Just hold on for the ride. It’s going to be the ride of your life.

What are you currently working on? What other releases do you have planned?

I am currently working on Cruel Fortune, which is book 2 in the Cruel Trilogy. It releases on April 23rd. The third and final book, Cruel Legacy, will release July 16th.
 

Thanks for blogging at HJ!

Giveaway: eBook: Cruel Money by K A Linde

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Excerpt from Cruel Money:

We were almost back to the swimming pool when we came upon Penn standing alone on the deck. His eyes landed on the pair of us, and something passed so swiftly across his face that I didn’t even catch what it was. But Lewis nodded at him and then hastily moved past.
Penn held out his hand, as if to stop me.
“What?” I asked. Venom was in my voice, and Lewis’s comments in the library came back to me. Maybe I did glare at Penn when we were together. I sighed and met his gaze, trying to keep the anger out of my tone. “Did you need something?”
“What were you two doing?”
“I wanted to see the library.”
Penn’s eyebrows jumped up his face. “Is that so?”
“Yes. Lewis was kind enough to show me.”
“Mmm,” he murmured.
Obviously, he didn’t believe me. Whatever. I didn’t have to answer to him.
“What are you doing over here?”
“I was thinking.” He shifted his gaze back out to the sea and seemed to disappear for a moment. The look was so familiar from our brief time in Paris that I sucked in a breath in surprise.
“About what?” I whispered, entranced by that faraway look.
“Do you know what eudaimonia is?”
My eyes narrowed. “You-da-what?”
He shifted to the side and laughed at my comment. “I’ll take that as a no.”
“No,” I agreed. I couldn’t figure out why in the world he was even talking to me about this.
“It’s a Greek term for happiness or well-being. It’s more accurately translated as human flourishing or prosperity. In ethics, we use it to describe Aristotle’s idea about how ethics contributes to happiness and that the goal in life is to reach eudaimonia.”
I stared blankly at him. “You lost me.”
He nodded. “I’ve seen that look on my students’ faces. There aren’t a ton of us anymore for a reason.”
“Is that what you teach? Aristotle?”
“Ethics mostly. That’s where my research interest lies.”
“Interesting.”
I surprised myself by leaning against the rail next to Penn. I should have stepped back and ignored this conversation. I didn’t need a philosophy lesson in the middle of an incredible day. I could just walk away from this. But, somehow, I couldn’t. I wanted to know more. I wanted to hear him speak about his passions. It was what had enticed me in the first place. And even knowing how this had ended before didn’t get me to back up.
“So…happiness?” I prompted.
“See, for some people, the past is a dark place. It’s everything you knew you shouldn’t be but were anyway. Until you find a way to achieve happiness and then abandon your past. To achieve a happier, more fulfilled life.”
His eyes bored into mine when he said it, and I read him loud and clear. Who he’d been before in Paris wasn’t who he was now. He was trying to be different, better than he had been. Of course, I had no proof of that fact. But he wasn’t trying to force his opinion on me here. He was giving me a lesson.
“Are all of your classes like this?” I asked with a hesitant smile.
He laughed and shook his head. “No, my job is much more boring than being with you.”
I opened my mouth to respond but then closed it. I didn’t know how to respond to that. I didn’t even know how I felt about that…or Penn. This trip had been confusing.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
 
 

Book Info:

Lose yourself to the dark and glamorous underbelly of the Upper East Side in USA Today bestselling author K.A. Linde’s new billionaire romance Cruel Trilogy.

She was supposed to be a one night stand.

A way to sate my sexual appetite.

I let her glimpse the man I am. The face that I hide behind my carefully cultivated life. But she ripped open that divide–and there’s no going back.

Now, she’s here. In my city.

I don’t care that I’m Manhattan royalty and she’s the help.

Only that she’s living in my summer home. With me.

And I want more

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Meet the Author:

K.A. Linde is the USA Today bestselling author of the Avoiding Series, Wrights, and more than thirty other novels. She has a Masters degree in political science from the University of Georgia, was the head campaign worker for the 2012 presidential campaign at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and served as the head coach of the Duke University dance team. She loves reading fantasy novels, binge-watching Supernatural, traveling, and dancing in her spare time.

She currently lives in Lubbock, Texas, with her husband and two super-adorable puppies.
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