The culture, and for the most part the characters, in Maximum Insecurity are Hispanic. Matty Madrid is a self-employed private investigator in Santa Fe. Early in her career, she was fired for insubordination by the sheriff's department. This same sassy, irreverent attitude still partially defines her. Add tough and gritty and you have the heroine of this book.

The novel opens as Matty is making one of her visits to Mingo, an inmate in the New Mexico Prison system. Mingo is the father of Matty's daughter Esperanza. When Esperanza was two years old, she fell down some steps sustaining serious head injuries which left her forever captured in time at that age. Mingo was not able to handle this and abandoned Matty.

Mingo asks Matty to investigate the recent prison death of Gordo Gonzales, who departed this life on a weight bench in the prison gym. Allegedly, one of the weights smashed his face. Mingo believes that Gordo's mother should be suing the New Mexico prison system for their negligence in this obvious murder.

Matty finds an attorney who is willing to take the case on a contingency basis. Key records are missing, requiring that Matty tap her incredibly large network of friends and informants. The first evidence unearthed is proof that the death was intentional. The physician's assistant who noted this on the report was fired the next day. After revealing he talked with Matty, he dies in a questionable suicide. Matty keeps digging and it soon becomes apparent that it can be fatal to even talk with her. Ultimately, Matty realizes that the system is protecting the killer. Why?

The investigation involves both the seamy and the respectable, with a myriad of unsavory crimes along the way. The tone is dark, and the representation of life in La Pinta is no doubt accurately characterized; and it is depressing.

The rhythm of Maximum Insecurity is rapid and uneven. Scenes shift too quickly, introducing new contacts or friends who conveniently come up with evidence that links the investigation to the next level. As a result, the reader will find new characters coming at him from all sides. And given the book's length (less than 200 pages), many of those characters are, inevitably, shallow and one-dimensional.

Still, the author does sustain the mounting tensions well. There are few mysteries that feature Hispanic culture. For that reason, I was glad to have read it. .

--Thea Davis