Alibi

June 22, 2009
Set in Philadelphia in 1986, this blistering first in a new urban noir series from bestseller Woods (True to the Game
) introduces 22-year-old Daisy Fothergill, a naïve African-American stripper. Daisy accepts $2,000 from an organized crime rep to provide an alibi for Bernard “Nard” Guess after he shoots two thieves to death as well as a buddy by accident in a North Philly drug house. An innocent witness to the bloodbath identifies Nard to the police, but pays a fatal price. When Daisy arrives home to tell her mother, Abigail, of her windfall and finds Abigail dead of natural causes, she discovers the $2,000 barely covers funeral costs. Her life takes an even nastier turn once Daisy starts dating Reggie Carter, a fast-talker who soon deserts her. Later, a pregnant Daisy flees to Murfreesboro, Tenn., to seek refuge with her aunt, but eventually she must return to Philly for a day of reckoning. This wickedly satisfying page-turner will leave readers eager for the next installment.

April 20, 2009
Verdict: Street-lit pioneer Woods (True to the Game) makes her hardcover debut with this gritty, botched robbery tale. While giving a sympathetic voice to her financially desparate heroine-who entertains no fantasies of knights in shining armor and uses sex to get what she wants-Woods observes that easy cash comes with a steep price. Her fans are sure to demand this; buy multiple copies. Background: In the novel's brutal opening scene, the attempted robbery of a Philadelphia drug lord's stash house goes seriously wrong, and three men die. The shooter, Nard, needs an alibi; he finds it in Daisy, a stripper who performs wearing four-inch stilettos and not much else. For a fast $2000, she agrees to testify she was with Nard in a private room at the time of the murders. But other interested parties-from the FBI to ruthless crime bosses-want to speak to Daisy. Fed up of being used by men, Daisy bolts from North Philly to rural Murfreesboro, TN.

Copyright 2009 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 1, 2009
Street-lit queen Teri Woods moves into crime thrillers with her latest novel. Daisy Mae lives a hard life with an ailing single mother, supporting them both by working as a naked exotic dancer. When her sometime-boyfriend, a drug dealer, asks her to provide an alibi for a soldier who was recently caught in a holdup gone bad, she readily agrees to do it for $2,000. Little does she know that her lie can never be left behind. Woods writes with feeling and a strong sense of her Philadelphia setting; in addition, her characters manage to become more than just the stereotypes they initially appear to be. Fast-paced and exciting, Alibi is an action-filled story about the desperate life of one urban girl and the consequences of trying to break away. Woods following will snap this up, but it can find a wider audience with thriller readers who liked George PelecanosThe Turnaround (2008) and with fans of the urban crime drama The Wire.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)