Devil in a Blue Dress

I love a good period-mystery. The intrigue, the clues, the lipstick. Immersed in a plethora of British mysteries lately (like this one and this one), I decided to read something set on this side of the pond for this week’s challenge.

The task: read a classic of genre fiction. So I turned to one of my favorite mystery writers – Walter Mosley. It’s been years since I sat down with one of his Easy Rawlins’ detective stories. When I picked up Devil in a Blue Dress, I had forgotten how hard it is to put down.

From the first page, Mosley not only sets the scene but immerses the reader in the middle of post-WWII Los Angeles. Easy Rawlins is minding his own business, hanging out in Joppy’s bar, wondering how he’s going to make his house payment. Joppy introduces him to a shady character named Albright who offers him a job. All Easy has to do is find a young woman named Daphne Monet. Unlike his name, the job is anything but.

It’s a world of violence, racism, hatred, and two-timing men not much different than our own. Through it all, Easy hears a steady voice that comes to him at his worst moments, when all he wants to do is run. As he says, “The voice is hard. It never cares if I’m scared or in danger. It just looks at all the facts and tells me what I need to do.”

And he gets it done.