Better Off Dead: 5 (Casey Jones Mystery Series) - Softcover

"Katy Munger's trademark -- a hard-boiled, plot-intensive mystery augmented by raucous humor and delivered by the brassy, wise-cracking heroine, Casey Jones."--"Ft. Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel

Casey Jones is as tough as they come. She's big, blond and shoots to kill with the best of them — even if she does lack an official PI license due to an unfortunate interlude behind bars. It takes a lot to faze her, but there are still some cases that hit her like a piledriver to the gut. This is one of them.Helen McInnes, the victim of a horrible crime, barely escaped with her life. Traumatized by the experience, she can no longer set foot outside her home. Further devastated by her attacker's acquittal and the anonymous threats she begins to receive, Helen turns to Casey for help reclaiming her life. Leaving Helen with a motley crew of bodyguards — including Casey's temperamental boyfriend Burly, her corpulent partner Bobby D., his equally rotund paramour Fanny, and a nearly comatose dog named Killer — Casey heads back to school. But she's prowling nearby Duke University with a different sort of education in mind: one that will help her unmasked fiend too is been using the campus as his personal hunting ground and enable her to survive him when she finds it.From Publishers Weekly:Raleigh, N.C., gumshoe, 160-pound Casey Jones (first introduced in Legwork) has more than her usual hassles. Her current beau, a cop, is berating her for agreeing to look for evidence that could overturn a woman's death sentence. The woman supposedly killed her husband, another cop. Not only does Casey run smack into several police departments who won't help her, but someone tries to kill her. And whenever she seems close to getting a break on the case, she turns up near a dead body and the police are certain she's involved. All the while, Casey tries to fortify herself with doughnuts, fried chicken and just about anything else, at least until she can sort out her case and her love life. Casey's size and tough manner belie her Southern roots; in fact, she wants a man to wait on her and woo her but only on her terms. ("I've kept telling him that he's going to have to kiss my .45 caliber ass for the next twenty years in order to atone.") The atmosphere is thick with greasy foods and pervasive corruption, but Casey makes this is a delightfully funny read, perfect for a rainy afternoon or long train ride.