Spotlight & Giveaway: Savage Hunger by Lisa Renee Jones

Today it is my pleasure to Welcome author Lisa Renee Jones to HJ!

Hi Lisa and welcome to HJ! We’re so excited to chat with you about your new release, Savage Hunger!

 
Hello! I’m so happy to be here to to introduce you to Savage!
 

Please summarize the book for the readers here:

Savage Hunger is the first book in the Savage Trilogy. Rick Savage left the love of his life because he wasn’t good enough for her. But years later, he’s brought crashing back into her life to save her. Their passion burns brighter that ever, but the reasons he left are still haunting him.
 

Please share the opening lines of this book:

Tequila is the Mexican version of the middle finger, the perfect “fuck you” to someone you either can’t kill or haven’t decided to kill yet. It’s liquid foreplay.
Exactly why I lift my shot glass at Adam, one of my compadres at Walker Security, and down the booze, a wicked bite following. “Sorry bastard,” I murmur because he just took my money in a card game in the backroom of a New York City bar a few blocks from the Walker offices.

Please share a few Fun facts about this book…

• Readers have been anticipating Savage’s story for so long, that I got major writer’s block while writing it, because I didn’t want to disappoint them with how his story turned out.
• I changed the heroine’s name midway through the book because I came up with a really cute and fun (and naughty) nickname that I could shorten her name to.

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

Savage is a mega alpha male, but he’s incredibly sarcastic, and such a unique character. Candace is a sassy and strong heroine, whose only weak spot is Savage. These two were a ton of fun to write, but they also surprised me at every turn. They’re unlike any characters I’ve ever written. This book definitely didn’t go where I thought it was going, but Savage has always had a mind of his own, so that’s very fitting.

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

The scene where they reunite 🙂 It’s pretty self explanatory. It’s a fun scene and definitely captures Savage’s character.

“Rick. Oh my God. Rick?”
At Candace’s voice, my heart freezes in my chest. I turn around and there she is, Candace is standing right here, all but in front of me. And God, she’s beautiful, her long, dark hair cascading over her shoulders. Her green eyes are like green grass on a perfect summer’s day, but they fleck amber with anger. Her pale skin flushed red. “Why are you here?” she demands.
“Holy hell, woman. I need to kiss you.” I take a step toward her.
The cop punches my arm and forces me back, and of course, I could go through him and I’m thinking about it, but Candace handles him for me.

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

Hopefully a deeper love for Savage. He has been such a huge part of so many of my books, I hope I started his story well.

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

Savage’s second book: Savage Burn, The Poet (straight thriller coming in 2020) and Dirty Rich Betrayal: Love Me Forever (for those who have followed my Dirty Rich series, this is Mia and Grayson’s wedding book)
 

Thanks for blogging at HJ!

Giveaway: Signed copy of Savage Hunger by Lisa Renee Jones

To enter Giveaway: Please complete the Rafflecopter form and Post a comment to this Q: Savage’s drink of choice (when he wants to let loose or forget Candace) is Tequila, what’s your favorite social drink?

 
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Excerpt from Savage Hunger:

“I’m Rick Savage, by the way, but most people call me Savage.”
“They call you Savage? Are you supposed to be making me feel better?”
“Savage can have many meanings, sweetheart,” he murmurs, his voice low, suggestive, and the obvious insinuation that he’s a savage in bed has my cheeks heating.
He chuckles. “Shy, are you?”
“I’m – not actually. Not really.”
“You did come at me like a freight train, I’ll give you that. Call me Rick.” He offers me his hand, a strong hand, that I’m now imagining on my body again, but this time in the most savage of ways. God. I don’t know this man and I’m fantasizing about him.
I steel myself for the impact of touching him and press my palm to his. Heat rushes up my arm and my gaze shoots to his. “Candace Marks,” I say softly, but when I try to pull back, he holds onto my hand.
“Nice to meet you, Candace,” he says softly, his eyes warm on my hot cheeks.
“I’m not sure if it’s nice to meet you or not yet, Rick.”
His lips curve and I find myself thinking about that kiss, about his mouth on my mouth. I tug at my hand and reluctantly, it seems, he releases me, or perhaps it’s me that didn’t really want him to actually let go. Until now, until this night and my encounter with Rick Savage, I didn’t realize how much I just need to be touched. Afraid I’m transparently desperate, I turn away from him, watching as rain transforms to hail plucking at the window. “What brings you here so late and in a storm?” he asks.
I shift to face him again, happy to be back on safe territory. “School and work.”
“What are you studying and/or working on?”
“Architecture. I’m interning right now under a rather famous architect. It’s a bit intimidating but exciting.”
“Interesting choice of career. What do you want to build?”
“Everything. I have so many dreams. The tallest building in the world that reaches well into the clouds. The most unique building in the world. The most secure building in the world. The most impressive homes on planet Earth.”
“That’s what I call passion. Are you following in someone’s footsteps?”
“No. I think it started with a fascination with pyramids and morphed into architecture. What about you? Why are you here late at night?”
“Med school. I’m a surgery resident at Fort Sam where my father’s an instructor.”
“My father’s at Fort Sam, too. He’s the commander for the North. Are you military?”
“I am, in fact, military.”
“Our fathers might know each other.”
He gives a nod. “I’m certain they must.”
“I thought soldiers were pack animals and yet you’re here, alone. It’s dangerous out alone, you know,” I tease.
He doesn’t laugh. He cuts his stare and grabs the steering wheel, his powerful forearm flexing with the tightness of his grip. “Sometimes alone isn’t the best place to be.” He looks at me, his eyes swimming with something I can only call dark and damaged before he says, “Now is it?”
I don’t know if he intends for me to actually answer that question, but I do. “No,” I say. “No, it is not.” And then before I can stop myself, I add, “Especially not tonight.” A confession, perhaps inspired by the hint of understanding between us that I believe he’s trying to confirm.
“Why not tonight?” he asks.
“You don’t know me. You don’t need to pretend to care.”
“I don’t pretend. Ever. And as for barely knowing each other, we are the freest we will ever be together. You don’t have to choose to see me again. You don’t have to think about the mistakes we’ve made together. You don’t have to do anything, including answering my question.” And yet he asks again. “Why tonight?” he repeats.
I exhale a shaky breath, my fingers twisting in my lap, my gaze shifting forward to the window, now drizzled with rain. The storm outside has calmed, but the one inside me has not. “My mom died last month. My dad is deploying to Iraq next week.” I glance over at him. “If that’s not enough, I live in a house I inherited from my dead grandmother who I loved very much.”
“Do you have a boyfriend, Candace?”
“No. I did, but he was military and a little too busy trying to impress my father for me to feel like anything was about me. What about you?”
“No one.”
No one.
There is something hollow in the way he says this that only drives me to want to know more. “What about you?” I ask, returning to the prior topic. “Why are you here alone, Rick Savage?”
He fixes me in a deep blue stare, and I swear I’m drifting in a sea of this man’s making. “To meet you. I just didn’t know it yet.”
The rain explodes around us again, an eternal roughening of the windows that only Texas does with such force. Thunder erupts with it, lightning in the distance, and I don’t know who moves first. Him or me. Suddenly though we’re in the middle of the seat and his fingers are tangling all rough and wonderfully in my hair, his mouth lowering to mine. “I’m going to kiss you now unless you object,” he says.
“Kiss me already, Savage.”
“Rick. Call me Rick.” And then his lips collide with my lips, his tongue a deep stroke of pure heat that has me moaning with the rush of sensation that assaults my body in the best of ways.
My arms slide around his muscular back, body pressing against his body, the hard lines of this incredible man absorbing more than the softer part of me. That need to be touched explodes inside me, demanding satisfaction. He pulls back and stares down at me. “Do you want to get out of here? Together.”
I tell myself this is crazy, insane, wildly out of my character. “I don’t do things like this. I don’t.”
He kisses me again and leaves me breathless. “Make me the first.”

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
 
 

Book Info:

Rick Savage, but they call him Savage and for a reason. He can make you laugh and then rip your heart out. No one knows that more than me, Candace Marks, the woman he left bleeding from the heart. I loved him. Lord help me, I’ve never stopped loving him.

Now, I’m engaged to another man, a brutal man I’m trapped into marrying, when to my shock, Savage returns home. Savage who I haven’t heard from in years. I want to hate him. I have ever reason to hate him, but I can’t. I still love him and I fear he will save me just to leave me bleeding one last time. He stirs my desires, a dark, delicious, and dangerous man destined to hurt me and leave me. This time I’m not sure I’ll survive.

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Meet the Author:

New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Lisa Renee Jones is the author of the highly acclaimed INSIDE OUT series. Suzanne Todd (producer of Alice in Wonderland) on the INSIDE OUT series: Lisa has created a beautiful, complicated, and sensual world that is filled with intrigue and suspense. Sara’s character is strong, flawed, complex, and sexy – a modern girl we all can identify with. Inside Out has been optioned to STARZ, Paramount, and now Marvista Entertainment. Marvista has also optioned the spin-off series, Careless Whispers.In addition to the success of Lisa’s INSIDE OUT series, she has published many successful titles. The TALL, DARK AND DEADLY series and THE SECRET LIFE OF AMY BENSEN series, both spent several months on a combination of the New York Times and USA Today bestselling lists.Prior to publishing Lisa owned multi-state staffing agency that was recognized many times by The Austin Business Journal and also praised by the Dallas Women’s Magazine. In 1998 Lisa was listed as the #7 growing women owned business in Entrepreneur Magazine.
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