Dirty work

Woods constantly surprises his readers, and nowhere is that more evident than in his latest thriller. Suave cop-turned-lawyer Stone Barrington is asked to hire someone to take photos of Lawrence Fortescue, the husband of a wealthy socialite, with a woman who is presumably his mistress. Stone hires the nephew of an old friend, who proves to be grossly incompetent when he falls through the skylight onto the man he's supposed to be photographing. Fortescue ends up dead, the supposed mistress disappears, and the photographer is charged with manslaughter. As Stone digs deeper, he discovers that Fortescue wasn't killed by the photographer's fall, but by an injection of poison. Enter Carpenter, aka Felicity Devonshire, Stone's contact in British Intelligence. Carpenter suspects the woman involved with Fortescue is actually Marie-Therese du Bois, a trained assassin with a grudge. Carpenter and her colleagues are in town to hunt down Marie-Therese, who is killing agents who were present when her parents were murdered. Carpenter is next on the list, and Stone is determined to protect her. Less predictably, he also wants to help Marie-Therese, whose parents may not have been killed accidentally. Readers will never be less than enthralled. --Kristine HuntleyAdult Books Young adult recommendations in this issue have been contributed by the Booklist staff and by reviewers Nancy Bent, Tina Coleman, GraceAnne DeCandido, Deborah Donovan, Patty Engelmann, Sally Estes, Roberta Johnson, Beth Leistensnider, Shelley Mosley, Regina Schroeder, Candace Smith, and Linda Waddle. Titles recommended for teens are marked with the following symbols: YA, for books of general YA interest; YA/C, for books with particular curriculum value; YA/L, for books with a limited teenage audience; YA/M, for books best suited to mature teens.

Woods's new mystery is as sleek and engaging as the upper-class lifestyle of its appealing hero, ex-cop-cum-lawyer-cum-private investigator Stone Barrington. Woods (Blood Orchid) rewards Stone (and readers) by bringing back the beautiful British intelligence agent, code-named Carpenter, who first appeared in The Short Forever, the preceding book in this series. But Carpenter brings Stone more than hot sex and clever dinner conversation-she inadvertently draws him into her life-and-death struggle with one of the world's most efficient and intelligent female assassins, La Biche. While on assignment for lawyer Stone, attempting to photograph an adulterous husband in flagrante delicto, a clumsy assistant gets into trouble and falls into the hands of the NYPD and British Intelligence. Stone's pal and ex-partner from his early days on the NYPD, detective Dino Bacchetti, aids in extricating the assistant, but the incriminating photographs soon involve both men in the hunt for La Biche, who is out to kill Carpenter and avenge an old wrong. Friend and foe alike feed outright lies to Stone and Dino as the chameleonic lady assassin piles body upon body. Woods writes in a dry, witty style that keeps all his characters on a likable keel. The amusing repartee between Stone and Dino is memorably funny. In the end, Stone supplies a surprising dose of morality, and the reader finds that there is more to the story than flesh, flash and derring-do. Author tour. (Apr.) FYI: Woods recently signed a new contract with Putnam to supply two more in this series as well as several other unspecified books over the next two years. (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

In Woods's latest novel, cop-turned-lawyer Stone Barrington is tapped by a wealthy client to get incriminating photographs of her cheating husband. Stone reluctantly accepts, but things really heat up when the husband winds up dead, a victim of his mysterious mistress. Beautiful British intelligence agent Carpenter, a prominent character, arrives on the scene and supplies the identity of the killer-an international assassin and master of disguise named Marie-Therese DuBois, better known as "La Biche." La Biche is out to kill those agents who were instrumental in the death of her parents, and Carpenter is next on the list. The plot is often implausible but moves at a fast pace, and the dialog is usually sharp and funny. Some listeners may find Robert Lawrence's cartoonish portrayals of the secondary characters irritating, but this work is entertaining, and the author's fans will be interested. Recommended for adult popular fiction collections.-Phillip Oliver, Univ. of North Alabama Lib., Florence (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

A routine stint of bedroom peeping sets jet-set New York lawyer Stone Barrington against an international assassin with more disguises than a barrel of cross-dressing monkeys. A clause Stone inserted into Lawrence Fortescue's prenuptial agreement with Elena Marks will cost him any claim on her assets or income if he's caught in flagrante, so when Elena gets wind of her bridegroom's latest assignation, she wants film at 11. Because Stone doesn't do such distasteful jobs himself, he hires photographer Herbie Fisher to get the evidence, then has to take care of Herbie when he phones from the local precinct after the skylight he was leaning on collapses, sending him hurtling down atop Larry's dead body. The real story here, however, isn't Herbie or even Larry, but Larry's companion, who fatally poisoned him (why?) just before Herbie dropped in and then took a powder herself. As Felicity Devonshire, the British agent Stone got to know as Carpenter in The Short Forever (2002), points out the morning after her bedroom exercise with Stone, the subject of Herbie's art hasn't been photographed since she was 12--eight years before British Intelligence killed her parents in a botched operation and she swore revenge. Now Marie-ThÉrèse du Bois (to give her the real name she uses only in the coffee breaks between chameleon changes of identity) has already murdered three of Carpenter's colleagues, and, as subsequent events demonstrate, she's only warming up. As in The Short Forever, but much more successfully, Woods keeps changing gears from one plotline to the next--Get the Pictures, Find the Woman, Broker the Meeting, Contain the Damage--so that, although no breath of reality ever disturbs the air of deluxe action, the tale puts both Stone and the reader through some exhilarating paces. A crisp, fleet timekiller: the fashionplate lawyer's best outing since Dead in the Water (1997). Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

/*Starred Review*/ Woods constantly surprises his readers, and nowhere is that more evident than in his latest thriller. Suave cop-turned-lawyer Stone Barrington is asked to hire someone to take photos of Lawrence Fortescue, the husband of a wealthy socialite, with a woman who is presumably his mistress. Stone hires the nephew of an old friend, who proves to be grossly incompetent when he falls through the skylight onto the man he's supposed to be photographing. Fortescue ends up dead, the supposed mistress disappears, and the photographer is charged with manslaughter. As Stone digs deeper, he discovers that Fortescue wasn't killed by the photographer's fall, but by an injection of poison. Enter Carpenter, aka Felicity Devonshire, Stone's contact in British Intelligence. Carpenter suspects the woman involved with Fortescue is actually Marie-Therese du Bois, a trained assassin with a grudge. Carpenter and her colleagues are in town to hunt down Marie-Therese, who is killing agents who were present when her parents were murdered. Carpenter is next on the list, and Stone is determined to protect her. Less predictably, he also wants to help Marie-Therese, whose parents may not have been killed accidentally. Readers will never be less than enthralled. ((Reviewed February 15, 2003)) Copyright 2003 Booklist Reviews

Barrington returns to New York, where the philandering husband he's asked to investigate turns up dead. Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

Woods's new mystery is as sleek and engaging as the upper-class lifestyle of its appealing hero, ex-cop-cum-lawyer-cum-private investigator Stone Barrington. Woods (Blood Orchid) rewards Stone (and readers) by bringing back the beautiful British intelligence agent, code-named Carpenter, who first appeared in The Short Forever, the preceding book in this series. But Carpenter brings Stone more than hot sex and clever dinner conversation-she inadvertently draws him into her life-and-death struggle with one of the world's most efficient and intelligent female assassins, La Biche. While on assignment for lawyer Stone, attempting to photograph an adulterous husband in flagrante delicto, a clumsy assistant gets into trouble and falls into the hands of the NYPD and British Intelligence. Stone's pal and ex-partner from his early days on the NYPD, detective Dino Bacchetti, aids in extricating the assistant, but the incriminating photographs soon involve both men in the hunt for La Biche, who is out to kill Carpenter and avenge an old wrong. Friend and foe alike feed outright lies to Stone and Dino as the chameleonic lady assassin piles body upon body. Woods writes in a dry, witty style that keeps all his characters on a likable keel. The amusing repartee between Stone and Dino is memorably funny. In the end, Stone supplies a surprising dose of morality, and the reader finds that there is more to the story than flesh, flash and derring-do. Author tour. (Apr.) FYI: Woods recently signed a new contract with Putnam to supply two more in this series as well as several other unspecified books over the next two years. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.