I love it when I am right.
I have read all the novels by Walter Mosley about Easy Rawlins, ever since I saw Denzel Washington in Devil in a Blue Dress (although I thought Don Cheadle’s performance stole the movie). As a white bread, white kid from the suburbs, I sucked up the stories of South Central Los Angeles, an area not that far from me, but so foreign.
When Mosley killed off Easy Rawlins, I wasn’t upset. I was intrigued. Mosley had already killed off Easy’s best friend, the psychopathic Mouse, and then brought him back two novels later. At the end of Blonde Ambition, Easy’s car goes over a cliff, but you never see the body.
He did it once, I told myself. He will do it again.
So this morning when I opened the L.A. times to the op-ed page, there is a Patt Morrison interview with Walter Mosley. Sure enough, Easy’s coming back. I did a little research on the Internet and it looks as if the next novel in the series, called Little Green (no release date that I can find), picks up where Blonde Ambition left off. That means Easy survived the plunge and is nursed back to health.
I am embarrassed. It looks as if this news has been out for a while.
I have read some of Mosley’s other novels—all of the Socrates Fortlow and Fearless Jones series, the first of the four Leonid McGill novels, and some of the one-off novels. Ezekiel “Easy” Rawlins remains my favorite, although they are quickly followed by Socrates and Fearless.
It looks as if Rawlins has been quite prolific as of late. He’s got a string of sci-fi novellas coming out. I think he has written some other sci-fi, but I have not read any. I’ll have to check up on it.
I also need to get up to date on the Leonid McGill series. Maybe over vacation.
Another thing that interested me was that Mosley also mentioned that he read comics, which he links to mythology. That puts him in the same league as Gary Phillips, another African-American writer I have read (see post).
Lots to do.
See ya’ later.
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