Dear Enemy

By: Kristen Callihan

Narrated by: Maxine Mitchell, Sebastian York

Length: 11 hrs and 52 mins

Publisher's Summary

From New York Times bestselling author Kristen Callihan comes a smart, emotional contemporary romance about finding love with the most unlikely of people.

As kids, they hated each other. Macon Saint was beautiful, but despite his name, Delilah knew he was the devil. That he dated her slightly evil sister, Samantha, was no picnic either. When they broke up, it was a dream come true: Delilah never had to see him again.

Ten years later, her old enemy sends a text.

Delilah's sister has stolen a valuable heirloom from Macon, now a rising Hollywood star, and he intends to collect his due. One problem: Sam has skipped town.

Sparks still sizzle between Macon and Delilah, only this heat feels alarmingly like unwanted attraction. But Delilah is desperate to keep her weak-hearted mother from learning of her sister's theft. So she proposes a deal: she'll pay off the debt by being Macon's personal chef and assistant.

It's a recipe for disaster, but Macon can't stop himself from accepting. Even though Delilah clearly hates him, there's something about her that feels like home. Besides, they're no longer kids, and what once was a bitter rivalry has the potential to be something sweeter. Something like forever.

©2020 Kristen Callihan (P)2020 Brilliance Publishing, Inc., all rights reserved.

Critic Reviews

"The premise allows Callihan to deliver a trope she has mastered: coldly furious enemies morphing into lovers." (Kirkus Reviews)

All the feels

I went into this book expecting a bully romance, and while there was childhood bullying, the majority of this book was pretty sweet! I hated the hero in the first couple chapters, but it didn’t take long at all for me to start falling for him! The heroine was a great character- smart, witty, sassy, and confident around anyone except her family and the H. There was so much character development, and lots of secrets to uncover. It was such a great story!!

The narration was perfect!! Maxine and Sebastian perfectly captured their characters! So good!

No just no

This book was over 10 hours of just listening to two people argue and complain to each other. Pretend like they hated each other. It wasn’t till the last 20 minutes that they finally figured out that they loved each other and there was anything to do with any kind of romance. It took me four days to get through this book and I just want my money back. But the narrators were great as usual.

Loyalisa30

Although this was my first book by Kristen Callihan it won’t be my last! I thoroughly enjoyed Delilah and Macon’s story! This story about childhood frenemies was excellently recounted and displayed that what does not destroy you makes you stronger! Macon and Delilah had to dig deep to claim their just rewards and cement the love they both needed and deserved! The only misfortune in the story was that Samantha didn’t suffer better consequences for her deceit and betrayal. Maxine Mitchell and Joe Arden were wonderful narrators who delivered heartfelt emotions to the story! It was well worth the listen 😍🥰🤩😍

The Heart Always Knows the Truth

After meeting them in Make it Sweet, I knew that I needed to find out the details behind Delilah and Macon's love story. Honestly, I was wary after reading the blurb since bully romances aren't really my thing and I wasn't keen on the hero having dated the heroine's sister (in Middle and High School). Kristen Callihan made me a believer though and I was pulled right into this story.

I think one of the things that made Dear Enemy work for me was that I truly felt that the characters were trying to work through things and not just excusing their prior poor behavior. There's so much hurt between Macon and Delilah and I appreciated how Kristen Callihan showed them struggle, be vulnerable, and eventually trust each other and move forward. The childhood bully aspect plays a large role in this story, but there's also forced proximity and slow burn enemies to lovers. I think the slow burn build up was absolutely necessary and made the transformation of Macon and Delilah's relationship so much more believable. It let things heat up to scorching hot and that bathtub scene... wow *fans self*. There is some predictable drama at the end thanks to Delilah's sister Sam (ugh she was so terrible!), but thankfully it's addressed and dealt with quickly. I would love to see North find a happily ever after one day and hope there are more books in this series.

Audiobook Review
Overall 4.5 stars
Performance 4.5 stars
Story 4-4.5 stars

I read and listened to this one and thought the narration by Maxine Mitchell and Sebastian York was wonderful. Maxine Mitchell especially shined and she really captured so much emotion in her performance. I really enjoy Sebastian York's narrations, but for some reason I didn't fully love him as Macon. Perhaps it's because he sounded a little too mature or possibly not gruff enough, but despite his great performance, something kept me from fully feeling him in this role. Overall, this was still a fantastic audiobook and a great listen.

CW: physical and emotional abuse, death of parent

4 Tot STARS

I really enjoyed this slow burn.

The banter was fantastic and there was a legitimate reason for their conflict and distrust of each other. The author really took the time to make sure that readers saw these two get together know each other and fall in love again.

The pacing, at times, was a bit slow for me, and there were moments that I found boring, but the beginning was engaging enough to keep me intrigued and the ending was phenomenal and kept me thoroughly entertained.

The narrators were enjoyable in terms of their pacing, dialect, and fluency. They really brought the characters to life.

Kristen Callihan is a favorite author of mine, and while I had some moments that dragged, overall, the writing is fantastic, the characters and likable and the chemistry between them great, and the story is entertaining.

Food, love and lies

This was a nice surprise and I fell in love with the way Kristen describes each of the cuisine that Delilah cooks and the chemistry both of them have....sort of Like Water for Chocolate story...

Unexpected Gem

Maxine Mitchell and Sebastian York are a match made in Heaven. Story was amazing! I will be looking into more Kristen Callihan books!

A really good book!

This is a great enemies to lovers book. I love the banter and the chemistry between Macon and Delilah . As always Sebastian York was fabulous and Maxine Mitchell brought Delilah to life. Very highly recommended!

Don’t bother

I cannot do another chapter about these stupid annoying characters. If these were teal people, I could not be around them.

Tooooooo long......

Gosh that was an investment of time....just an ok story for me. The premise was weak ...all over a stolen watch?sister working off the payment? This part was soooo drawn out. Could have played up the movie star part more IMO. Never felt romantic to me. This is no go for me. Had a lot of potential if it could have been cut in half in time.

Good romance novel

Solid characters with good background and motivation for their actions. I enjoyed this good quality romance novel.

The voices of the performers were very pleasent to listen to.

Really lovely book

Stumbled onto this audio book whilst looking for an easy listen, without the weak heroine, and it really was a nice easy story, a bit predictable, the story flowed as well, definitely be checking out this author again

what a good story and performance.

Read this book on KU and thoroughly enjoyed it. The audio performance was no less enjoyable and the characters were brought to life.
Both pleased and sorry to get to the end.

Move over 16 Candles...

This needs a movie adaption... it has all the good romance juice.

Delilah and Macon haven't always had the best relationship, in fact, its been epically terrible. Enemies-to-lovers fluff and oohhhh the pining!

Macon can say he wasn't mooning over Delilah but he completely was. Of course he was dating her sister at the time, which is awkwardness all on its own.


Skip forward from a disastrous Prom and Samantha has created some horrific trouble for her sister.
Macon is pissed but eager to get the chance to spend time with a grown up Delilah.

Fireworks, drama and missing watches.


Just buy it, and fall in love with it like I did.

oh dear!

It has great banter but the story is abit dragged out. HEA ending could have been better.