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Munch Mancini #8
An Unacceptable Death
One thing about Miranda Mancini that has never changed is the name everyone knows her by---Munch. But the child abused by her father and sent into prostitution, the young girl who stole money because she couldn't do without her drugs, the woman who spent awful months in prison---that person no longer exists. Instead, Munch Mancini is the surrogate "mother" of a friend's loving little girl, a woman who can top any male car mechanic's talents with a tool, and the unbelievably happy fiancée of police detective Enrique "Rico" Chacón. It's an ordinary life and it's exactly what she wants.
Everything changes when an early-morning call from homicide detective Mace St. John, the nearest thing Munch has to a father, brings unbelievably terrible news. Rico is dead, having been shot during a drug bust. Munch learns that Rico was shot by one of his fellow officers---and not by accident. This news energizes Munch in a way she wouldn't have believed possible. She knows in her head and her heart that Rico could not have been on the wrong side of the drug bust.
The police department insists that Rico was working with the drug dealers. But a pair of special officers with Narcotics have other ideas. They ask Munch to go undercover and mix with the suspected dealers. They are certain it will prove that Rico was innocent. Munch agrees. She could easily end up dead herself---but if she can clear Rico's name, she will have what she wants. That's Munch Mancini.
Everything changes when an early-morning call from homicide detective Mace St. John, the nearest thing Munch has to a father, brings unbelievably terrible news. Rico is dead, having been shot during a drug bust. Munch learns that Rico was shot by one of his fellow officers---and not by accident. This news energizes Munch in a way she wouldn't have believed possible. She knows in her head and her heart that Rico could not have been on the wrong side of the drug bust.
The police department insists that Rico was working with the drug dealers. But a pair of special officers with Narcotics have other ideas. They ask Munch to go undercover and mix with the suspected dealers. They are certain it will prove that Rico was innocent. Munch agrees. She could easily end up dead herself---but if she can clear Rico's name, she will have what she wants. That's Munch Mancini.
- GenresMystery
256 pages, Hardcover
First published December 27, 2005
58 people want to read
About the author
Barbara Seranella
11 books19 followersBarbara Seranella was an American author known for her gripping crime novels. Growing up in Pacific Palisades, California, she ran away at 13 to San Francisco, joining a hippie commune and learning auto mechanics on the streets. Seranella later married Walter Haring and became a devoted mother to Michera Nicole Colella and Maryann Colella, raising both girls as her own. Drawing on her adventurous early life and sharp observations, she authored more than ten novels, including No Human Involved, No Offense Intended, and Deadman's Switch, blending crime, suspense, and realism. Seranella lived in La Quinta and Laguna Beach, California, and passed away in 2007 while awaiting a liver transplant.
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Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
September 5, 2014
RATING: 4.75
PROTAGONIST: Munch Mancini, auto mechanic
SETTING: 1980s California
SERIES: #8 of 8
Way back in 1997, I ran across one of the most unique characters that I’ve ever seen in a book. Her name was Munch Mancini. Her life was pretty much a mess. She had been a biker chick with all that implies, gotten into a life dominated by drugs and was working as an auto mechanic. After reading NO HUMAN INVOLVED, I knew that I would be following Munch wherever she was going. Fortunately, as time passed, she got a handle on her life, went clean and sober and even adopted a little girl, Asia. Munch will always be a little rough around the edges, but over the course of eight books, she’s grown in unexpected ways and is now a woman who’s pretty much got it together.
As AN UNACCEPTABLE DEATH opens, Munch is preparing for her wedding to undercover cop Enrique “Rico” Chacon. Just as with everything else in Munch’s life, their relationship wasn’t an easy one. They’ve finally learned how to live with and love one another, when the worst possible thing happens. Rico has infiltrated a drug gang and is killed during a drug bust. Unbelievably, the cops seem to feel that Rico “turned”, that he had actually been a part of the gang operations and therefore refuse to provide his family with any of the benefits that are usually accorded to a cop’s survivors.
As you can imagine, Munch is completely decimated by Rico’s death. But she’s just mad enough at what is going on to try to set things straight. With the help of one of her former biker chick friends who has also gone straight, she tries to clear Rico’s name and help his family. She’s caught in a maelstrom of danger involving unreliable police investigators, a biker chief that is looking for vengeance and a group of Mexican drug traffickers that has everything at stake.
AN UNACCEPTABLE DEATH is one of the very best books in the Munch Mancini series. Seranella does a fine job of developing an engrossing plot while peopling the book with characters that live and breathe. And just as in that first book of so long ago, she incorporates the little details that make the narrative completely plausible. As much as the book will break your heart, it will also cheer you as you see a woman who has so much life turn away from despair and face the future with determination and hope. Long live Munch!
PROTAGONIST: Munch Mancini, auto mechanic
SETTING: 1980s California
SERIES: #8 of 8
Way back in 1997, I ran across one of the most unique characters that I’ve ever seen in a book. Her name was Munch Mancini. Her life was pretty much a mess. She had been a biker chick with all that implies, gotten into a life dominated by drugs and was working as an auto mechanic. After reading NO HUMAN INVOLVED, I knew that I would be following Munch wherever she was going. Fortunately, as time passed, she got a handle on her life, went clean and sober and even adopted a little girl, Asia. Munch will always be a little rough around the edges, but over the course of eight books, she’s grown in unexpected ways and is now a woman who’s pretty much got it together.
As AN UNACCEPTABLE DEATH opens, Munch is preparing for her wedding to undercover cop Enrique “Rico” Chacon. Just as with everything else in Munch’s life, their relationship wasn’t an easy one. They’ve finally learned how to live with and love one another, when the worst possible thing happens. Rico has infiltrated a drug gang and is killed during a drug bust. Unbelievably, the cops seem to feel that Rico “turned”, that he had actually been a part of the gang operations and therefore refuse to provide his family with any of the benefits that are usually accorded to a cop’s survivors.
As you can imagine, Munch is completely decimated by Rico’s death. But she’s just mad enough at what is going on to try to set things straight. With the help of one of her former biker chick friends who has also gone straight, she tries to clear Rico’s name and help his family. She’s caught in a maelstrom of danger involving unreliable police investigators, a biker chief that is looking for vengeance and a group of Mexican drug traffickers that has everything at stake.
AN UNACCEPTABLE DEATH is one of the very best books in the Munch Mancini series. Seranella does a fine job of developing an engrossing plot while peopling the book with characters that live and breathe. And just as in that first book of so long ago, she incorporates the little details that make the narrative completely plausible. As much as the book will break your heart, it will also cheer you as you see a woman who has so much life turn away from despair and face the future with determination and hope. Long live Munch!
October 1, 2020
I read and loved the first of these what feels like a thousand years ago, then gobbled up as many of the next as I could find. This is the last of the Munch Mancini series and it feels like losing an old, good (weird, very old LA) friend. Then to find out that Barbara Seranella passed - in 2007! Damn.
Maybe I didn't read all of them, I add, hopefully. Great book, wonderful character, characters actually. My favorite genre: great books based in Los Angeles. I'll miss them.
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-x...
Maybe I didn't read all of them, I add, hopefully. Great book, wonderful character, characters actually. My favorite genre: great books based in Los Angeles. I'll miss them.
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-x...
November 22, 2024
Poor Munch - finally has happiness in her grasp and then it is snatched away, leaving her to question her beliefs. There are a lot of characters here, with dubious agendas and a whole lot more action. Still a fun read.
June 20, 2018
Very Intriguing story, I enjoyed it.
August 6, 2022
Read in 2006. The final Munch Mancini mystery. It was a fun ride.
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May 28, 2014An Unacceptable Death, by Barbara Seranella, a-minus, Narrated by Anna Fields, Produced by Blackstone Audio, downloaded from audible.com.
While this is the 8th book in the series, Blackstone recorded it, and Audible Inc., bought it, in 2006. This means that everyone reading audible books read the last book in the series first. Barbara Seranella wrote no more Munch Mansini books because she died in 2007. The first seven were finally produced by Audible Inc. in April, 2014. I’m hoping that the 8th book will be re-recorded, or that Audible will remind people that it has been done.
Here is what I wrote about this book whenI read it in 2006.
In this book, Munch seems to have it all. She has a good job managing a gas station. Her adopted daughter, Asia, is doing well in school and is growing up, now at age nine, as a very confident and competent little girl. They have a dog, Jasper, and Munch is about to marry her boy friend, an undercover narcotics officer. Her biggest concerns were the wedding plans, and whether her fiancé would let her invite her friend, Crazy Ellen, (who he disapproved of) to the wedding. Then, in a heartbeat, things changed. Rico, her fiancé was killed in a police shoot-out with drug dealers gone very wrong. Munch and Ellen find themselves involved in trying to figure out why he was killed. The rumor is that he was a dirty cop, but Munch refuses to believe that is true. Munch is being used by several groups of people, and she is using them to find out the truth about Rico’s death. This is a wonderful book with well-drawn characters. Seranella tells a wonderful story. It’s clear she lived through the ‘70’s and ‘80’s and knows of what she speaks. Munch is a likeable and believable woman who still faces her demons of drugs and alcohol and must slay them every day. But Munch has developed the stamina to live through adversity, even the adversity of having her lover taken away from her when it finally appeared she had found her partner for a life-time.
While this is the 8th book in the series, Blackstone recorded it, and Audible Inc., bought it, in 2006. This means that everyone reading audible books read the last book in the series first. Barbara Seranella wrote no more Munch Mansini books because she died in 2007. The first seven were finally produced by Audible Inc. in April, 2014. I’m hoping that the 8th book will be re-recorded, or that Audible will remind people that it has been done.
Here is what I wrote about this book whenI read it in 2006.
In this book, Munch seems to have it all. She has a good job managing a gas station. Her adopted daughter, Asia, is doing well in school and is growing up, now at age nine, as a very confident and competent little girl. They have a dog, Jasper, and Munch is about to marry her boy friend, an undercover narcotics officer. Her biggest concerns were the wedding plans, and whether her fiancé would let her invite her friend, Crazy Ellen, (who he disapproved of) to the wedding. Then, in a heartbeat, things changed. Rico, her fiancé was killed in a police shoot-out with drug dealers gone very wrong. Munch and Ellen find themselves involved in trying to figure out why he was killed. The rumor is that he was a dirty cop, but Munch refuses to believe that is true. Munch is being used by several groups of people, and she is using them to find out the truth about Rico’s death. This is a wonderful book with well-drawn characters. Seranella tells a wonderful story. It’s clear she lived through the ‘70’s and ‘80’s and knows of what she speaks. Munch is a likeable and believable woman who still faces her demons of drugs and alcohol and must slay them every day. But Munch has developed the stamina to live through adversity, even the adversity of having her lover taken away from her when it finally appeared she had found her partner for a life-time.
August 19, 2007
AN UNACCEPTABLE DEATH (Amateur Sleuth/Mechanic-Santa Monica, CA-Cont) – VG
Seranella, Barbara – 8th in series
Thomas Dunne Books, 2006-Hardcover
“Munch” Mancini is clean, sober, raising her daughter and about to get married to undercover policeman “Rico” Chacón. Rico is killed in a drug bust and Munch told he’d been killed by officers as a duty cop. But Munch doesn’t believe it and, in working to find out the truth, finds herself between two different enforcement agencies and two drug dealers, none of whom seem to care if she survives.
*** I hate when authors kill off the major love interest. But I do appreciate when the author does it well and the protagonist’s reaction is convincing. Seranella has created great characters in Munch, her daughter Ellen, with excellent and realistic interaction between the two, and Munch’s friend Ellen. I particularly liked that even the villains had balance as characters. The story is well balanced well sorrow, humor, determination and tension. For me, this was one of the better books in the series.
Seranella, Barbara – 8th in series
Thomas Dunne Books, 2006-Hardcover
“Munch” Mancini is clean, sober, raising her daughter and about to get married to undercover policeman “Rico” Chacón. Rico is killed in a drug bust and Munch told he’d been killed by officers as a duty cop. But Munch doesn’t believe it and, in working to find out the truth, finds herself between two different enforcement agencies and two drug dealers, none of whom seem to care if she survives.
*** I hate when authors kill off the major love interest. But I do appreciate when the author does it well and the protagonist’s reaction is convincing. Seranella has created great characters in Munch, her daughter Ellen, with excellent and realistic interaction between the two, and Munch’s friend Ellen. I particularly liked that even the villains had balance as characters. The story is well balanced well sorrow, humor, determination and tension. For me, this was one of the better books in the series.
January 23, 2011
#8 and final Munch Mancini mystery. Munch, now clean and sober for nine years and living a stable life with her adopted daughter Asia, is enjoying planning her wedding to police detective Rico Chacon, when he is shot to death by other cops in a drug bust gone wrong. Among allegations that Rico was a dirty cop, Munch stuffs her grief and despair to the back of her soul while she lets her practical side take over and sets out to prove that he wasn't.
She believes Rico was killed because of her--she had just learned that there is a bounty on her head, put there by the former head of an outlaw biker gang that she all but dismantled when she went straight. Now the gang is re-forming and their first order of business is to take Munch down, and she wonders if he somehow got in the middle of that. She makes deals as a confidential informant with a couple of groups of cops and then essentially does what she needs to do anyway to figure out why Rico was killed.
An excellent ending to this series, very sad and poignant, yet hopeful too. I am going to miss Munch a lot.
She believes Rico was killed because of her--she had just learned that there is a bounty on her head, put there by the former head of an outlaw biker gang that she all but dismantled when she went straight. Now the gang is re-forming and their first order of business is to take Munch down, and she wonders if he somehow got in the middle of that. She makes deals as a confidential informant with a couple of groups of cops and then essentially does what she needs to do anyway to figure out why Rico was killed.
An excellent ending to this series, very sad and poignant, yet hopeful too. I am going to miss Munch a lot.
August 2, 2008
This is the first Seranella novel I’ve sampled, and I’ve been most pleasantly surprised by its quality. She’s a smart, talented writer who approaches crime from a different perspective, that of someone who once fell to rock bottom but now is doing the best she can to raise her adopted little girl. Munch is no PI, but she does know her way around the seamier side of LA, and her instincts are trustworthy.
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September 11, 2013Munch (aka Miranda) Mancini is a person that has been down at the bottom but has managed to turn her life around to include a good job, a finance (Rico a police officer) and a child that loves and depends on her. Just when she's ready to say I do happiness is snatched away and she must deal with what happened to him and setting things to rights. Would be interesting to know more about the back story.
November 19, 2011
I picked this up on a whim at the library, read a couple pages and it looked interesting. Figured it would be ok, just a filler book. I was wrong, this was a really good read. Lots of twists and turns and you feel like you have it figured out, and then Boom! it changes again.
I will definitely keep my eye out for more books by this author.
I will definitely keep my eye out for more books by this author.
September 9, 2014
A good story but, in my view, not really a good mystery. The facts of the author's life are very close to those of the main character and the book jacket mentions that the author is a member of the Orange County chapter of the "Sisters in Crime (although she is probably one of the few members who was ever actually a criminal)"
September 16, 2010
Intriguing protagonist "Munch" former prostitute, druggie, motorcycle chick gone straight, become a mechanic and in love with an undercover cop who is killed early in the novel. I'd read others in this series.
October 27, 2011
THE LAST MUNCH NOVEL EVER !!! What a shame. one of my favorite all time characters. She loses her fiance and then the trouble insures. Was he a cop or a dirty cop working with a drug lord. Very little Mace St. John in this novel. So sorry to see Serenalla pass away.
April 4, 2017
Munch Mancini is about to marry her undercover police officer boyfriend, when he is killed. The police claim he was "dirty" but Munch does not believe that for a moment. She gets involved trying to clear his name and is almost killed herself.
Want to read
February 6, 2008Munch Mancini Bk 8
June 26, 2013
Audio version. Must have been abridged as I think a few of the details got lost in the ending. Narrator wasn't my favorite reader, but characters where interesting.
March 29, 2017
Not nearly as good as the previous one I read, way over the top in violence and confusion.
May 3, 2017
Nice clean dialogue, but too much violence.
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews