Eden Black isn't just a gorgeous alien female who looks basically like an ethereally lovely human made entirely of gold -- she's also an assassin. A tough-as-nails, lone gunman-type. Or at least, she was before she screwed up her first major assignment and got nailed by the target, instead of killing him.

Now a really evil slave trader is on the loose, and Eden is determined to bring him down and prove herself to her adopted human father, who also happens to be her boss. Michael Black agrees to let her try, on one condition. Eden has to work with another agent -- Lucias Adaire. Adaire is arrogant and convinced that Eden is nothing more than a spoiled little girl playing at being an alien assassin. But sexy sparks fly along with the fists, and Lucias and Eden turn out to make a pretty dynamite team. Which is good, because the slave trader they're after is serious scum, and their plan to infiltrate his operation is seriously risky. There's a lot that can go wrong and when most of it does, Eden and Lucias have to trust each other to make it out alive.

ENSLAVE ME SWEETLY is Showalter's follow-up to AWAKEN ME DARKLY, her first book set in this alien-inhabited version of Earth. AWAKEN had a truly ass-kicking heroine in Mia Snow, a deeply sexy hero and some very tight pacing. The pace hasn't slowed down in this second installment in the Alien Huntress series, but unfortunately, the other elements don't coalesce quite as well. Eden is not very compelling, through no real fault of her own -- she's set up to be interesting enough, but somehow never is. Lucias' dark backstory is just as full of possibilities, but Showalter seems to shy away from the opportunities presented by her characters' damaged pasts. The basic building blocks of a great plot are all here, and the pages fly by, but at the end of the book, the reader is left with a bittersweet sense of the many missed chances for depth and complexity. Here's hoping Showalter brings Mia Snow back for the third Alien Huntress book.