TEST
Did I buy this book because of the attractive East Asian man on the cover? Reader, I did. Was I disappointed? Reader, I was not.
Amy Morrison has everything on track – a successful real estate career, a doctor fiancé named Mason, and the perfect three-bedroom house in a great Toronto neighborhood just waiting for them to move in and start their family. Until, that is, the fiancé leaves her at the altar, and Amy flees to her office, where, since everyone else is at the wedding, she’ll have privacy. Except she didn’t invite her 49th floor enemy, CEO Dax Harris, so it’s Dax who finds Amy breaking down in tears. In the spirit of the unusual occasion, Dax curbs his caustic tongue, and takes Amy out to drown her sorrows. Suddenly, these two enemies realize there’s more to like about each other than they ever realized.
I enjoyed Amy’s complexity. She flips between competence under pressure and uncertainty and vulnerability in other contexts, which is more truthful to me than heroines who are all badass, all the time. Her hobby of residential real estate (her job is commercial) is useful to the plot but also consistent with her planner mentality, plus it shows that the author has a stronger grip on Amy’s industry than most authors who write generic ‘developing company’. It also lets us explore in depth the Toronto setting, from Dax’s home on the quirky Ward’s Island to a condo development at the Shops at Don Mills.
As for Dax, he is a tech squillionaire, and while there’s more discussion of what his company develops than in some books, it’s not especially detailed. He is a nice Beta hero though, and I like a hero who is close to his family. He is biracial Chinese and white British and takes after his dad, which means, you guessed it, non-brown eyes (Dax’s are green, and for a more thorough read on why this is off-putting, see this great blog post from Writing with Color). However, I enjoyed the character of his mother, who reminded me a lot of the older Chinese women in my life. His sister Kat, who is in the middle of becoming a single mother via IVF, is also a rounded, interesting character.
The first weak spot in the book is that Amy is over her wedding jilt way too quickly. Maybe she doesn’t love Mason, but that just makes being jilted less awful, not totally fine. The second thing that really bothered me was Dax’s Big Reason I Can’t Date, which I simply have to warn you is about suicide. It was shallowly developed and served the plot rather than explored the issue with sensitivity or nuance. It also means that the forces keeping Amy and Dax apart lack tension, since you just have to wait for Dax to decide he will move on.
The book is very strong on consent, which is important to me. When Dax takes Amy out on her wedding night, she gets drunk and wants to pick up a man because she has only slept with her fiancé for the last seven years. Not only does Dax refuse to be intimate with her, but he is also a wingman for her in this vulnerable state, taking her home to protect her from a less scrupulous man. Later, when Amy and Dax are getting physical, Amy becomes panicked, and Dax immediately backs off and shifts his focus to emotional support.
I enjoyed Jenny Holiday’s Bridesmaids Behaving Badly quartet, another set of Toronto-based contemps. If you’re a fan of those, or of contemporary romance in general, Sleeping With Her Enemy is a strong and solid read.
Buy it at: Amazon or shop at your local independent bookstore
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Grade: B+
Book Type: Contemporary Romance
Sensuality: Warm
Review Date: 03/04/20
Publication Date: 02/2015
Recent Comments …
Yep
This sounds delightful! I’m grabbing it, thanks
excellent book: interesting, funny dialogs, deep understanding of each character, interesting secondary characters, and also sexy.
I don’t think anyone expects you to post UK prices – it’s just a shame that such a great sale…
I’m sorry about that. We don’t have any way to post British prices as an American based site.
I have several of her books on my TBR and after reading this am moving them up the pile.
I'm a history geek and educator, and I've lived in five different countries in North America, Asia, and Europe. In addition to the usual subgenres, I'm partial to YA, Sci-fi/Fantasy, and graphic novels. I love to cook.
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Thank you N and Caroline. I think, this is something I will struggle through. However, I am glad to have had this discussion.
I very much appreciate your comment. It is always important for me to reflect on how I can be a better, more inclusive reviewer. While I do my best to imagine what my writing sounds like to readers, I know I don’t do it perfectly and I will apply your comments in my future writing.
Caroline, was it necessary to say that you bought a book with an attractive East Asian man on the cover? You could have just said that you bought a book with an attractive man on the cover without referring to his nationality.
Why? In the book, his East Asian heritage is a huge part of who he is. I think we are allowed to say certain physical types are attractive to us. I’m baffled why that would be offensive, really I am. Can you explain your thinking to me? Thanks.
The reason I felt it was important to say is that publishers shy away from non-white cover characters (being able to make the ethnicity ambiguous is one of the factors in the cartoon cover blurb). I think it is important to express that a man of color – and particularly an East Asian man, demographic saddled with many stereotypes around masculinity and attractiveness – can not just not hinder a book, but can actively sell it. If someone in marketing points to this post some day it would bring me great joy.
Also I like seeing his face every time I open my kindle.
Thank you for your replies. I appreciate your views which expand our perspectives. Diversity and wider representation is essential in reducing prejudice and dominant conceptions of what is beautiful or attractive. Too often, media will refer to the race or ethnicity of a person, in a negative or crime story (i.e. black, asian or “native”), but not when it is a “white man”. This hopefully explains my sensitivity of the reference to him as “East Asian man”. The depiction and photograph speaks for itself – to his attractiveness or desirability. Reference to his race or ethnicity, however well-intended, seems to me to be quite unnecessary. It highlights difference. I wonder, would one refer to a main character and a cover photo as a “white man”? I think not.
The first rule of diversity, equity, and inclusion work is that impact matters more than intent, so I apologize for the negative impact that this review had on you.
I would not highlight the hotness of a white male cover model as “hot white man,” that is definitely true. However, my reason for highlighting the model’s background was to give a specific quote item in case someone in art, marketing, design, etc ever went looking for evidence to argue in favor of choosing an East Asian model on a future project (“See, we sold an EXTRA copy because of that cover!”). I don’t believe any publishers demand data to justify defaulting to whiteness (nor would I be interested in providing this evidence), so that’s a main reason I wouldn’t identify the whiteness in a hot white model.
Oh, another reason for mentioning the hero’s race is search engine optimization/ data tracking. I got really interested in the topic of the history of cover diversity at Harlequin a few weeks ago when we had a review/conversation about Jayci Lee’s Temporary Wife Temptation (you can see it here – https://allaboutromance.com/book-review/temporary-wife-temptation-by-jayci-lee/). Covers can be changed on reissue, so it might be that in a few years we won’t know what this book’s cover looked like unless I specifically wrote a description.
I wanted to make this book findable for people who were searching for books with Asian cover models, both from that historical perspective – maybe to research or do a data science project – and from a “I want to be able to vote with my dollars” perspective. “East asian cover” is a phrase which search engines will catch.
@Usha and @Caroline Russomanno- In regard to mentioning race, this thread reminded me of an article I read a while back about sensitivity readers. Here is a relevant passage (the protagonist in question is half Asian and the writer is white): “She hired three sensitivity readers, who all gave feedback. Hecker did not describe race in her initial draft, something she was told was typical for white writers. As a person of colour, it was suggested that Mira would make note of white characters’ ethnicities, in the way a white character would make note of black or Latino characters.”
So to respond to Usha’s question, “I wonder, would one refer to a main character and a cover photo as a “white man”?” I think it would depend upon the race of the person writing the review.
Here is the complete article for those interested: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/apr/27/vetting-for-stereotypes-meet-publishings-sensitivity-readers. Personally, I have mixed feelings about sensitivity readers that I don’t care to get into on this thread if I can help it. But I thought the article was relevant to this discussion, regardless of my views on the subject.
The cover caught my eye in particular because Asian men (as so many people have commented) just aren’t featured on romance novels. Often a couple may be an Asian woman and a European man (or American man if it’s a contemporary) but an Asian hero is much more rare. And while you may not say a “handsome white man” as that’s kind of generic- you would definitely hear someone say “a handsome Italian guy” or “a hot French guy” or a “gorgeous Scandinavian guy”. Think of all the category titles that have names like “The Greek Tycoon’s innocent secretary”. People definitely have “types” they like and admiring a good looking Asian man isn’t any different than admiring another ethnicity. I enjoy the diversity. It’s such a nice change from the 90’s when every cover guy was a long haired Fabio!
Nicely stated. I agree with you and Ms. Grinnan that there’s nothing wrong with having types.
As an interesting aside, I actually had the pleasure of meeting Fabio a few years back, long before I had read my first romance novel. He was on tour selling protein shakes and I happened to stumble upon his booth when I was doing some other business. We had a nice chat. He was a great listener and nice to everyone, including annoying people like me who were trying to sell him stuff rather than buying his product. :)
I actually felt kind of sorry for him because most of the people who waited in line to talk to him just wanted photographs and autographs- including some guys. While waiting in line, I noticed the guys were pretty much in three categories: 1) Men who were enamored with him 2) Guys who thought it would be a funny joke to have their picture taken with an iconic man of romance covers and 3) Husbands who got dragged along by their wives. :) But he was invariably kind to all and didn’t rush anyone. Just a fun story of the day.
I have read in articles over the years that he seems to be a very nice guy and a real gentleman. I admire how he took some minor, niche fame as a romance cover model and translated it into more general fame, commercials etc. Johanna Lindsey books and heroes will forever in my mind be associated with him.
“I have read in articles over the years that he seems to be a very nice guy and a real gentleman.” Oh, very! And I’m glad he was able to expand his niche modeling as well. It is so hard to make it as anyone in the arts, whether as a writer, actor, model, etc., so I’m always pleased with the ones who are able to make it. They are, unfortunately, in the very tiny minority.
Usha,
As someone who is Asian and very interested in Asian representation in romance novels, I found Caroline’s comment completely necessary. The romance genre, and too much American media, has a long history of diminishing Asian characters, especially Asian men, too typically portraying them as sexless or unattractive. Pointing out the attractiveness of this East Asian model is exactly “reducing prejudice and dominant conceptions of what is beautiful or attractive.”
As I pointed out in the thread for Temporary Wife Temptation, the first contemporary Harlequin or Silhouette romance I’ve been able to find with both a hero and heroine of Asian descent is Wedding? Impossible by Karen Templeton. It’s a book where the publisher saw fit not to show either the hero or heroine on the front cover or use either of their last names on the back (they’re just “Mike” and “Zoe”), evidently believing the predominantly American readership wouldn’t want to buy a book with an Asian-American hero and heroine if they knew they were Asian. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0056I05C4
Years later, Silhouette published a book with a Japanese hero, Mergers and Matrimony by Allison Leigh. Not that you would know it from the cover, because they cut off his head: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B005Q0B7P6/
Continuing a theme, Jade Lee wrote two contemporary romances for Harlequin Blaze with Asian heroes. Funny (or not so funny) enough, both were depicted with their heads cut off above the eyes:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0373793782/
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0373794932
One of the rare contemporaries from this period to show the face of the Asian hero is Tall, Dark and Irresistible by Joan Elliott Pickart. You just have to be sure to use the Zoom function to see that he is. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B007679RPE
Even today, books with Asian heroes especially on the cover are a drop in the bucket (books with white heroes are still 95% of the genre–someone saying they bought a book because of the white hero on the cover wouldn’t make a bit of sense, because it wouldn’t say anything about why they bought that over any of the hundreds of books out there with white men on the cover). Having an Asian hero on the cover, and someone saying they bought it because of that, still means something. It means a lot.
Nicely stated! Color blindness is an ideology that undermines different racial groups and assumes we live in a post-racial society. Pointing out difference and valuing it is an important step toward racial equality.
Excellent examples, N. Just looking through the supermarket a few months ago, I noticed a similar phenomenon with a couple of James Patterson’s “Alex Cross” books. I am not a reader of the series, but I have heard that it stars a black protagonist. Guess what? One book showed Mr. Cross so far away that you couldn’t tell what race he was and the other book had his white partner on the cover instead of him!
Another example: When Kevin Kwan went to pitch “Crazy Rich Asians” for the movie adaptation, one studio told him they would make the protagonist a white woman. Mr. Kwan thankfully turned them down, saying that missed the whole point of the story.
Minorities have even had to fight to play complex villains let alone heroes. Francis Ford Coppola had the hardest time convincing the studio to cast Al Pacino as Michael Corleone. They were insisting on either Robert Redford or Ryan O’Neal because of their star power and also told Coppola that besides the fact that Pacino was an unknown, he was too short, dark, and ethnic looking. According to the DVD commentary I heard, Coppola replied to that ridiculous argument by saying something like, “So you’re telling me that a 100% ethnic Sicilian whose people actually come from Corleone is too short, dark, and ethnic looking to play a character who is a 100% ethnic Sicilian whose people come from Corleone. You’re going to have to explain that one to me.”
Here’s another somewhat related article I found on Harlequin Blog. The topic was choosing a perfect setting for a romance, but it is quite disheartening the things the author was told regarding her original choices. She was told Ohio wasn’t romantic enough for a story. (Uh, last time I checked, Ohio still has people being born, so there are definitely some things going on behind closed doors…). Then she was dissuaded from setting her book on the Jersey Shore because of the stereotypes surrounding it. Think about that for a moment. Because of marketing decisions, someone thought it was better to move a romance that might have dispelled some of those stereotypes to a setting without such a connotation. Ugh… Here’s the article: https://harlequinblog.com/2020/02/writing-advice-choosing-the-best-setting-for-your-romance/.
Your knowledge of covers continues to impress and educate, N! Thanks for pointing out these problematic examples – there is no doubt that those crops are intentional.
I just remembered another interesting example of covers “covering up” ethnicity. The old Silhouette romance A Nice Girl Like You by Alexandra Summers has a heroine named Samara, which is a name of Arabic origin. She goes by Sam. Summers has extensive experience in the Middle East so she definitely chose this name on purpose. The back cover of this book calls the heroine Samantha instead of Samara. https://www.amazon.com/Nice-Girl-Like-You/dp/0263813215/
Holiday always knocks it out of the park!
I loved this book. It’s the first Jenny Holiday I read and it has all the things that make her very best books–Famous, oh how I love you–so good.
I read this book at the start of my AAR life! I think Dabney tweeted about the series and I asked her about it. Might have been one of my very first tweets ever! I liked this series a lot. Launched my love of contemporary romance!
Great review Caroline, I’m glad you picked this one up!