Imagine forsaking an MBA and a successful six-digit job to slide down to New Orleans and enter the world of women's boxing?as a competitor Set in New Orleans to the brooding rhythms of hip hop and boxing, Sarah K. Inman's FINISHING SKILLS is gritty, honest, poignant, and startlingly good. With its entirely unique cast of female boxers, ex-con trainers, Mexican Mormons, ?yin-yanging bin-banger MBAs, ? and Northeastern transplants of the Americorps variety, FINISHING SKILLS is like no other novel I have ever encountered. What it does is it dances. It comes rushing at you with blazing red speed, yet at unexpected moments, turns you with feline grace. Heidi Whitehill, the enigmatic main character of German-Polish descent who leaves the business world to pursue professional boxing, will first demand your attention, then command it, inspiring you to risk all and fight, work to finish what you need to finish, so you can finally be free. ?Jennifer Paddock, A SECRET WORD At once sexy and tough, a young novel of determination and exploration.