Enemy Within »

Marcella Burnard is a member of RWA and the Fantasy, Futuristic, and Paranormal special-interest chapter. She currently lives with her husband and their cats on a sailboat in Puget Sound in Seattle, Washington, and blames her father for her love of science fiction and fantasy.

An intergalactic cold war-and some heated passion- from an inventive new voice in futuristic romance.

After a stint in an alien prison, Captain Ari Rose wonders why she even bothered to survive. Stripped of her command and banished to her father's scientific expedition to finish a Ph.D. she doesn't want, Ari never planned to languish quietly behind a desk. She wasn't built for it, either. But when pirates commandeer her father's ship, Ari once again becomes a prisoner.

As far as pirate leader Cullin is concerned, Ari's past imprisonment puts her dead center in Cullin's sights. If she hasn't been brainwashed and returned as a spy, then he's convinced she must be part of a traitorous alliance endangering billions of lives. Cullin can't afford the desire she fires within him and he'll stop at nothing, including destroying her, to uncover the truth.

Publishers Weekly

Political intrigue, titled aristocrats, duels, xenobiology, and starship captains feature in Burnard's over-the-top SF romance debut. Capt. Ari Idylle lost her command after being imprisoned, tortured, and inexplicably released by the alien Chekydran. When a small band of men seizes her father's ship while it's engaged in a scientific expedition, Ari butts heads with the band's captain, Cullin Seaghdh, who proves uncannily capable of manipulating her. Ari finds Cullin both arrogant and attractive as they work together to evade a Chekydran ship hot on their trail, but when Ari learns that her former commanders have placed a remote-controlled bomb in her head, she no longer knows who to trust. The ending is marred by a grotesque scene of sexualized violence, but readers will love the powerful emotion and futuristic costume-drama trappings. (Nov.)