Books-n-Kisses is super excited to have one of our favorite authors Molly Harper on the blog today!!! Molly just had a new release Better Homes and Hauntings
Molly, can you please share with us a little about yourself.
I am a newspaper reporter turned church secretary turned romance novelist from western Kentucky. I am married to my high school sweetheart, a captain with our local police department. I am obsessed with sushi and Tom Hardy movies.
Have you always wanted to be an author?
Yes, but I didn’t think the chances were good. There aren’t many authors from Paducah, Ky. So I pursued a career in journalism because I thought it would be awesome to make my living writing in some capacity. (I was right. It was awesome.) But the schedule was insane. Combined with my husband’s even less predictable schedule, it made life with kids pretty complicated. I took a more stable position as a secretary at a local Baptist church and started writing books at night.
What is your most interesting writing quirk?
I have to have lip balm nearby. Preferably the little Eos balls.
Can you please tell us about your latest book(s)?
This is my first standalone paranormal romance and my first haunted house story, so I am thrilled to have written my own grown up, highly romantic version of a Scooby Doo episode. The Crane’s Nest is a Gilded Era mansion that never quite made it as a family home since Gerald Whitney, the business tycoon who built it was accused of murdering his wife shortly after it was completed. The murder mystery and inevitable stories of hauntings and family curses followed the Whitneys throughout the generations. Deacon Whitney, a social media mogul who has managed to rebuild his fortune, wants to restore the house to its former glory and finally put the supernatural rumors about his family to an end. The team of experts he assembles to remodel the house is contracted to live there over the summer while the work is completed, a measure he had to take after mysterious noises and cold spots chased away previous teams.
Landscaper Nina Linden is hired to rehabilitate the gardens and she sees it as her chance to rebuild her failing business after being cheated by her unscrupulous ex-partner. She never expects that her new client would see more in her than just a green thumb. But Nina shows no signs of being scared away, even as she experiences some unnerving apparitions herself. And as the two of them work closely together to restore the mansion’s faded glory, Deacon realizes that he’s found someone who doesn’t seem to like his fortune more than himself—while Nina may have finally found the one man she can trust with her bruised and battered heart.
But something on the island doesn’t believe in true love…and if Nina and Deacon can’t figure out how to put these angry spirits to rest, their own love doesn’t stand a ghost of a chance.
How did you come with the idea for this story?
I knew I wanted to set in on an island. I thought about the coast of Washington or South Carolina. And then I saw one of those true murder mystery shows and the episode was set on Newport. I took one look at the houses and there and thought, “Oh, yeah, I could haunt that.” I looked up info on the Breakers, Rosecliff, The Elms, all of the Gilded Era mansions and the ghost story practically wrote itself.
Can you share with us your current work(s) in progress?
I am working on several spin-offs to the Half-Moon Hollow series. I could tell you about them, but then Ophelia would send a vampire goon squad after me.
Who is the one author that you would love to meet someday and why?
Nora Roberts, because she is the queen. I would say Jane Austen, but if she was walking around, that would mean zombies are a thing and I don’t want that to happen.
What is the best piece of advice you would give to someone that wants to get into writing?
Just sit down and start writing. Don’t wait until you have time. Don’t lose yourself in research. Just sit down and do it.
Can you share with us something off your bucket list.
See Italy. I would go to Venice and eat all of the gelato. All of it.
What is in your To Read Pile that you are dying to start or upcoming release you can’t wait for?
I am eager for the next book in Mari Mancusi’s Scorched series.
Is there anything else you would like to add?
I will be writing several more spin-offs to the Half-Moon Hollow books. Also, my Half-Moon Hollow Christmas short story, I’M DREAMING OF AN UNDEAD CHRISTMAS, will be available in ebook on November 3, 2014. And third book in the Bluegrass contemporary series, SNOW FALLING ON BLUEGRASS, will be released on September 22.
You can find out more about Molly Harper here: Website | Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads
*****
Better Homes and Hauntings
Release Date: 06/24/14
Amazon
When Nina Linden is hired to landscape a private island off the New England coast, she sees it as her chance to rebuild her failing business after being cheated by her unscrupulous ex. She never expects that her new client, software mogul Deacon Whitney, would see more in her than just a talented gardener. Deacon has paid top dollar to the crews he’s hired to renovate the desolate Whitney estate—he had to, because the bumps, thumps, and unexplained sightings of ghostly figures in nineteenth-century dress are driving workers away faster than he can say “Boo.”
But Nina shows no signs of being scared away, even as she experiences some unnerving apparitions herself. And as the two of them work closely together to restore the mansion’s faded glory, Deacon realizes that he’s found someone who doesn’t seem to like his fortune more than himself—while Nina may have finally found the one man she can trust with her bruised and battered heart.
But something on the island doesn’t believe in true love…and if Nina and Deacon can’t figure out how to put these angry spirits to rest, their own love doesn’t stand a ghost of a chance.
Check out Kimberly’s review of Better Homes and Hauntings
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