Desperate Hoodwives

The title only hints at the freaky-deaky content in the first installment of a street lit series that could also qualify as urban erotic horror. In Atlanta, Bentley Manor is a cage for four young women. Aisha, whose pampered lifestyle takes a big hit after her dealer husband gets locked up, goes to dangerous lengths to keep up her ghetto fab image. Devani is single and, at her mother's direction, plans on tricking NFL star Tyrik Jefferson into marrying her by getting pregnant. Lexi has five kids by four men and hopes Luther, the man who finally married her, will buy them a house, but will his sub-par sack performance tank her dreams? Molly is the “white trash” wife of oversexed, abusive and often absentee Junior; she, like the other women, dreams of getting “up out Bentley Manor.” The authors, who also publish under Niobia Bryant and Adrianne Byrd, hold back little in this cautionary tale dripping with sex, vice and yearning. (Feb.)