A debut mystery by a highly regarded author of literary novels, a gritty African-American noir with the atmosphere of Dashiell Hammett and the multicultural appeal of Walter Mosely. Set in New York, Too Beautiful to Die introduces Blades Overstreet, a black ex-cop, now at odds with the NYPD over the incident that prompted his resignation-a buy-and-bust operation gone bad when a white cop "accidentally" shot and nearly killed him. Now, the man who saved Blades's life prevails upon him to help a beautiful soap-opera star named Precious find her father. But that assignment quickly turns sour when Blades stumbles on the murdered body of an FBI agent, and he becomes the target of an FBI/NYPD manhunt. Blades Overstreet is destined to become one of the great heroes of crime fiction and Glenville Lovell a new star of the genre.