Your Alibi by Annie Dean

TITLE: Your Alibi
AUTHOR: Annie Dean
PUBLISHER: Liquid Silver Books
LENGTH: Novel (roughly 81k)
GENRE: Contemporary erotic romance
COST: $6.20

Addie Alger’s world is slowly falling apart. She’s got a widowed father burying his grief in crazy inventions, a gentle giant of a brother-in-law who’s burying his grief in other ways, an ex-husband who’s ruined her credit rating and left her thousands in debt, and a hotel in the middle of Nowhere, California that hasn’t had a customer in months. Financial relief comes at last when she hits on the idea of an online company, providing alibis to cheating spouses. It might not be the most ethical of methods, but at least it pays the bills.

Until Sean Duncan, the husband of one of her customers, shows up and starts looking for answers. His marriage is falling apart, and he wants to know why. Addie takes advantage of a physical attraction to try to distract him, but real life always has different plans.

There’s a lot that could potentially scare people away from this story. Like, the heroine helps people cheat for a living. Or, the hero is married when the two start their affair. But you know what? The story works anyway. It works for a few reasons, not the least of which is Ms. Dean’s absolutely gorgeous and refreshing prose. She’s funny, and evocative, and it’s very, very easy to get lost in her turns of phrase. Simple observations, such as It’s a hell of a thing, Sean reflected, to face your lover’s father, stark naked, that made me laugh out loud, or evocative descriptions that make the characters and setting leap off the page.

It also works because her leads are eerily normal in a world of crazy. They talk like real people. They act like real people. I could easily imagine knowing either one of them at various points of my life. Because of that, it’s easy to forgive or forget the less than moral circumstances that bring them together. Because guess what? Sometimes we make less than moral decisions. That’s life.

Where the story stumbles is in its length. While the first half of the story trips merrily along, taking the reader along for the crazy, amazing ride, the second half has a tendency to drag, as scenes that slow the pace get in the way of the story’s focus. More than once, the author dances around confronting the morality of what Addie is doing, and more than once, she dances right away from it. It probably doesn’t fit the comedic tone of the book to really address it the way it should be, but in that case, Ms. Dean should have just backed away from the entire issue in the first place.

Still, it’s an engaging read, and the author has a distinctive voice that makes me want to read her other stuff. I have to say, too, that while I sometimes found Sean a bit bland, his final speech to Addie got me. The last line of the story left a smile on my face, which, considering the tone of the entire book, is exactly what Ms. Dean intended, I'm sure. That means a job well done.

Readability	8/10 – Some gorgeous prose, though extraneous scenes and unneeded detail at crucial pacing moments detract
Heroine	8/10 – Spunky and fun, a breath of fresh air
Hero	7/10 – An Everyman that makes a nice change from some of the angstier heroes
Entertainment value	8/10 – This would be higher if the second half had been tighter; the story drags and loses focus
World building	10/10 – Gorgeous, original prose brings the Grail and this world to life
TOTAL:	41/50