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An Unacceptable Death: Library Edition (Munch Mancini Novels)

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Those who haven't had the pleasure of meeting Miranda "Munch" Mancini are in for a treat and a surprise. She's nothing like the conventional female crime fighters; in fact, she's not very much like a "conventional" gal at all. She's a recovered drug addict and prostitute who now makes her living as an auto mechanic and limo driver. And, in the hands of Barbara Seranella, a writer with a gift for creating gritty but appealing characters in painterly detail, she has become one of the most popular protagonists in crime fiction.

With the opening of Seranella's eighth in her Mancini series we find Mancini in Santa Monica where she lives with Asia, her nine-year-old daughter. She's in love with a cop, Enrique "Rico" Chacon , who's on undercover detail charged with ferreting out narcotics dealers.

To get an idea of who Mancini is, this is the way her neighborhood is described as she strolls along the sidewalk with Rico: "If she had lived in a nicer neighborhood, she would have warned her neighbors that this vatto-looking guy was really a cop and in disguise. But between the bikers across the street, the houseful of probably illegal aliens next to them, the crazy okie next door with the in-bred daughter, and the alcoholic divorcee on the other side, it was probably safer for all concerned to say nothing."

Sounds like a savvy gal who can handle just about anything, doesn't she? There is one thing that she definitely cannot handle and that's the death of Rico. He's shot by fellow cops during a soured drug bust. Then, when officials hold back Rico's pension from his family and accuse him of corruption, she comes out fighting.

Enlisted by a detective friend to work in secret among the drug hustlers, she's the one who is now undercover in order to find out exactly who the bad cops are. That's a dangerous game, even for someone who knows that terrain as well as Mancini does. But, she's going to avenge Rico and clear his name, whether it kills her or not.

Anna Fields, winner of several AudioFile awards gives a sharp narration. Her voice is strong, firm, nothing soft about it, which is pinpoint casting for this powerful mystery.

- Gail Cooke