Enslaved

I was lucky enough to receive an advanced review copy of Gena Showalter‘s latest: Enslave Me Sweetly. Since the first book in the alien huntress series, Awaken Me Darkly, is my favorite of Gena’s novels, I was over the moon to get my hands on this one!

And then, I was unlucky enough to lose my copy in a box of stuff I had packed to take home from my job when I quit. Fortunately, I found it again, and as soon as I got a chance (read: wasn’t at BEA, wasn’t driving to Ithaca, wasn’t getting my tooth fixed) I devoured it.

Enslave Me Sweetly isn’t a usual sequel. Rather than starring Mia Snow, the take charge alien police squad/judge/executioner from the first book, EMS concerns alien assassin Eden Black. Where Snow had to adhere to the laws of her alien control agency, Black is a private agent. Black is also an alien, one of a beautiful race called Raka, whose skin, hair, and eyes look like molten gold. Because of their appearance, the peaceful Raka refugees on Earth have been hunted almost to extinction. Eden Black however, was adopted and raised by a human father, a rich and powerful head of the assassin organization who also designs weaponry. She’s an interesting mix of “spoiled princess” and incredibly capable assassin. But when her latest job, taking down an alien who enslaves human women for offworld transport, goes bad, her dad partners her with another agent Eden finds as stubborn as she is, and absolutely irresistible. Together, they find a way to catch the bad guys.

Despite the serious subject matter of assassins and human slavery, EMS is a much lighter book than its predecessor. Eden really loves her job, and is not tortured by the personal angst Mia Snow carried around. Though Eden’s parents were murdered when she was very young, and she is constantly aware of how others have and will always view her, as a beautiful, exotic alien, she’s a generally upbeat and pragmatic individual. She enjoys the finer things in life (like the all-too-rare in this future vision water showers, and the sugar her race sprinkles on everything they eat, from eggs to water — hence the “sweetly” in the title) and doesn’t waste time angsting over the blood on her hands or the mistakes she’s made when she can actually go out and fix things.

As with AMD, I enjoyed the focus this book put on the heroine and the journey she makes, Though there is a romance in this book, and Lucius, the hero, has plenty of screen time (and chances to get horizontal with Eden) the real strength in Enslave Me Sweetly is the fascinating and complex character of Eden Black. Her status as “other” permeates every line of this book, despite the protection she receives from her human father’s influence. I couldn’t imagine living my life that way, constantly being viewed as an object that some would want to hang as a trophy on their wall, rather than as a person. In several scenes, strangers on the street involuntarily reach out to touch Eden’s gorgeous golden skin. Her alien nature is not merely lip service to be utilized and abandoned on a scene by scene basis. Indeed, I think part of the reason Eden manages to rise above the darkness of her job is because the Raka are a pleasure-seeking race. She is a strong and capable assassin because of the way her father raised her, but she refuses to let it overrun her life, and the dichotmy fits in well with her alien nature.

It’s a fascinating read. Check it out. Also, I want to know from Gena: Any chance of seeing a certain honorable telepathic alien king in a future book, hmmmmm?