How hard could it be to kidnap a pampered little rich girl? Especially if you’re bounty hunter extraordinaire Dante Giovanni, who normally prowls the underworld in search of the most vicious criminals. Piece of cake, Dante thinks, when reclusive businessman Gary Vandergriff offers him a cool half million to bring home his estranged daughter, Nadia. His first meeting with her is stunning; both literally and figuratively. He foils an attempt on her life, and falls immediately under her spell. It’s not gonna be hard duty, Dante thinks, keeping her safe from the Mexican drug lord infuriated by her stepfather’s expanding meth operation. He’ll take her out of harm’s way, no problem, get her back to her father, and enjoy the ride along the way. Everything is great. Until he delivers her into enemy hands.
Nadia Branson at first struck me as a Paris Hilton type – rich, spoilt and totally irresponsible. Why else would she go up to a stranger (Dante) at a local diner and nibble his ear while he’s choosing a song at the jukebox? Girls get raped for doing that, doesn’t this heroine know? Nadia redeems herself, though, and turns out likeable and kick-ass. She holds her own in a tough situation and even saves Dante by getting her father to send in a rescue team for him.
I hesitated when I saw the cover of In Enemy Hands but I have a thing for Vin Diesel so I just had to check out the back blurb! It sounded interesting so I bought it despite the cheesy cover. Admittedly, I groaned when Nadia behaved in that reckless manner and I didn't want a romance with such a young heroine either. My preference is for 28-31 and my heroes 32-40.
I was glad I read on, though, as IEH turned out to be very enjoyable. Unfortunately, it appears that Ms Perry writes young H & H because her new book, Three Motives for Murder (May 2007) again features a youngish H & H. Despite enjoying IEH, I am giving the new book a miss.
IEH was fast-paced and Dante was not only sexy, he was nice. While I prefer my Bad-Boy heroes, I do nice every now and then. I would have liked more development on Dante's character, though. I was trying to figure out what race he was and never knew. He could have been a very, very dark Italian or colored guy adopted by Italians...what I do remember is that he's six feet tall with brown eyes but somewhere Ms Perry must have mentioned his being dark such that combined with the cover, I had a colored guy in my head.
Dante is sweet and his protectiveness towards Nadia is sweet, too. I'm not sure if I'd give the book such a high rating if I were to read it a second time. Most likely not and suspect my B grade was due to being surprised after such an uncertain start.
I did buy Ms Perry's previous title, Cain and Abel, but never got past the first few chapters.
I found this book to be too slow for my tastes. The characters were fine, but the dialogue just did not flow smoothly or seemed forced, IMO. The plot was good! It was the writing style that just didn't mesh with my brain. Something was "off." Didn't feel the emotions of the characters and was not at all drawn into the story via them. Bummer.
Chemistry was off but the characters were likeable and sorta of cute together. The villain was super hateful so seeing him go down was pleasurable .. overall some parts were enjoyable and other parts were a bit boring but it's a nice read.
There's nothing wrong with it, but there's nothing exceptional about it either. It felt like a first novel to me, someone feeling their way into writing.
I have to say that I do agree with some comments in here, it was as if the author was gaining her first publishing.But despite the cover (which I don't like that much) it was an entertaining read.