ENEMY WITHIN by Marcella Brunard
This is a fantastic read. What an adventure. Warp ten with your hair on fire all the way!!
Wow, and I was totally and pleasantly astonished by the author’s final play, but enough of that topic. I don’t want to spoil it for you.
We meet Ari-AKA Captain Alexandra Rose Idylle-who has recently been released from a POW camp/situation and is on the road to recovery. Unfortunately, things are not going as planned. One Captain Cullin Seaghdh (Shaw? Seg-i-dew?) and his band of merry men have taken over her father’s science ship. Not willing to simply let that happen, Ari goes to bat for the ship and its crew. Unfortunately, Captain Seaghdh is more than capable of counteracting her every move. In fact, he seemed to know every action she would take before she took it. How was that possible?
Because she was the object Seaghdh had been sent to retrieve.
This is a multi-layered mystery and, as I said, it is awesome! I was more than pleasantly surprise with each discovery. “You go, girl!” I kept crowing aloud because, to my satisfaction, Ari came into her own with each revelation. Seaghdh was a pleasant interlude, a lovely love interest, and a kewl wrench-in-the-engine. Hawt!
But what really crashed into my awareness was the unbelievably awesome worldbuilding regarding The Big Bad-an alien government and it’s very repulsive citizen, called Captain Hicci of the dread Chekydran Empire. Hicci is a gross and repellant character in both form and character. I hated him. His enjoyment over the torture of his captives was…EWWWWWWWWWW! And I mean that in a good way. What a concept!
This book, written by the very capable Marcella Burnard, is a stunning story and one that is due to become well known among the Sci-Fi/Romance audience. Two things I want to complain about, and these are personal nits so I didn’t knock the book’s rating down to reflect it. A) easy with the hard to pronounce names. I understand the intent, to show the difference between the many varying peoples within the book’s universe, but the truth is that I don’t speak Celtic so it was a stumbling block for this reader. (Seag? Sou-gtth?) B) more carnality. Those two characters could have burned up the sheets. Sure, I bow to the author’s desire to do something else in a reflection to Ari’s mental and physical recovery, but sheesh, I needed a cold shower every time Ari and “Shaw” were in the same room. A promise that rarely ever came to completion! (ßHo ho ho! I made a funny!)
But, again, that’s simply my preference and clearly not the author’s.
ENEMY WITHIN is highly, highly recommended. I can’t wait for book two.
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