Uncle Janice

The heroine of Burgess’s novel is 24-year-old Janice Itwaru, an “uncle”—NYPD slang for undercover narc—just a month shy of getting her detective shield. The promotion won’t be easy. Working the mean streets of Queens circa 2008—dealing with pushers, pimps, and addicts—is not the best way to stay alive. Then there are her backbiting fellow uncles, her Alzheimer-suffering mother, and a probable Internal Affairs investigation to worry about. What’s an ambitious, fiercely dedicated cop to do? Make a plan. This richly detailed account of a young policewoman’s life on the streets is given a narration by Fulginiti that is the perfect complement to Burgess’s authentic dialogue and realistic portraits of cops at work and play. She catches Janice’s shifting attitudes, as the hapless character stumbles from near disasters to moments of self-satisfaction and elation, and she creates a multitude of voices for the book’s large cast of characters—slow-talking dopers, suspicious dealers, macho “uncles,” demanding and unfeeling big bosses. Fulginiti uses a range of accents, and she does so with enough subtlety to avoid complaints of stereotyping. A Doubleday hardcover. (Jan.)