Sweet Enemy by Heather Snow

 February 28, 2012

Again with the kaleidoscope eyes!
 http://heathersnowbooks.com/

For those of you who don't know me, when I read a book I take notes, which is all well and good.  However, if I'm reading a paper book, I tend to take notes on what ever happens to be close by - post-it notes, an envelope, a bill, a Kleenex, napkin, anything handy.  Well, sometimes these little notes get lost, which is what happened with this book.  (An advantage with the Nook, one does not loose the notes.)  Anyway, I found myself jotting down the variety of eye and hair colors that both our hero and heroine had.  However, I lost the notes, so from memory: violet, amethyst, purple, and lavender eyes for her, cobalt blue for him (I think), amber, red, copper hair for her.  I don't remember his hair changing colors.  Now, this didn't make the book bad by any means, but every time I read a different description I smiled.  I'm not sure it's really necessary to use the color wheel when describing our characters.

On to the book.  Sweet Enemy, by Heather Snow, is Ms. Snow's debut effort and overall, it was a pretty good book with just a few minor hiccups.  And, they are my hiccups - not every reader out there has the same hiccup-ery capacity. We have a couple of interesting main characters in this book.  Liliana, a smart heroine - and, I do mean smart, not a fake smart heroine as oftentimes crop up among the pages.  This one is quite intelligent; in fact, sometimes I felt as if I were back in school.  She is proficient in chemistry, which would be a mighty big stumbling block for a woman in the time period she was situated in.  However, I enjoyed her intelligence. I also found her to be pretty humorous and able to take care of herself.  I loved how she irritated the hero, Geoffrey, and at the same time made him a better man.  And, I found another use for sugar.

Then we have our hero, the Alan Alda of his day, Geoffrey.  He was almost too good to be true, with saving the world and such, and I nearly raised my eyebrows, but didn't.  I also enjoyed Geoffrey's acceptance of Liliana's intelligence and abilities. When these two get together, they bicker, they try to outdo each other, they challenge each other.  Then that protagonist/antagonist relationship slowly blossoms into friendship.  Ms. Snow did a great job showing people liking, then falling in love. 

There is also a nice mystery to be solved and a villain to be found.  Now, because I've read a bazillion romance books, I was able to spot the villain right away, so there was no surprise there.  However, the mystery caused the Trust monster to rear its ugly head and that is where I had a minor problem. 

Spoilers.  Now, we learn that Liliana believes Geoffrey to have somehow been involved with her father's death.  Or, someone in his family was involved.  Which is the reason she's at his house party, to discover who the murderer is/was...so, it is understandable that she would not tell him the reason for her being there.  Of course, as time passes and these two become closer, we the readers know there is going to be a problem when Geoffrey finds out the "real" reason she's there.  And, do you know why it will be a problem?  Because of his horrible, deceitful, lying, two-timing, not to be trusted mother.  So, when Geoffrey finds out about Liliana's secret, he reacts.  And, he reacts in a way that a lot of romance heroes do...he cannot - will not trust Liliana. 

I thought about this issue after I finished this book.  So, thank you Ms. Snow for that.  Now, I liked Geoffrey a lot. He was mature, caring and intelligent.  He liked Liliana.  He talked to Liliana.  He got to know her and when she was finally honest with him, because he was a more mature hero, I was expecting him to be maybe a little hurt but I was hoping he'd be more accepting of what she had done.  And, because he was the Alan Alda of his time, he should have been able to forgive and not gone off on a "cannot trust you" tangent.  His reaction didn't seem in character to me.

But in the end, even with the trust hiccup, this was a fun read and a great beginning for author Heather Snow.  I will be looking forward to the next book that Ms. Snow publishes.  Job well done!

Time/Place: Regency England
Sensuality Rating: Warm to hot