Devil in a Blue Dress (Easy Rawlins, #1) in 100+ Books in 2025

Mar 28, 2009 Chuck rated it really liked it

Any mystery novel set in Los Angeles is going to get compared to Raymond Chandler, although Chandler was just pretty much taking Carrol John Daly and transplanting him to LA. I mention this because--historical novel, LA, private eye, noir genre--comparisons to Chandler are natural. But those are surface similarities, genre similarities. In Devil and a Blue Dress, Walter Mosely is doing many new things, things that make it well worth reading.

First, if you've read any of these hard boiled detectiv Any mystery novel set in Los Angeles is going to get compared to Raymond Chandler, although Chandler was just pretty much taking Carrol John Daly and transplanting him to LA. I mention this because--historical novel, LA, private eye, noir genre--comparisons to Chandler are natural. But those are surface similarities, genre similarities. In Devil and a Blue Dress, Walter Mosely is doing many new things, things that make it well worth reading.

First, if you've read any of these hard boiled detective novels, you'll probably note that the main character is pretty static--already fully formed, wise cracking, morally centered on a personal code of contact, brave and resourceful. They don't change through the course of the novel, and, if there's a series, they don't change novel to novel. They are the western gunfighter, imposing order (through force) on a threating world, only the "range" they "ride" is the mean streets of an urban setting. This is true of Carrol John Daly's Race Williams, Dashiel Hammett's Sam Spade, Chandler's Philip Marlowe, and Robert B. Parker's Spenser (my favorite mystery sereis of all time).

But Easy Rawlins', Mosley's protagonist, is much more fully developed. He's a laid off aircraft worker trying to meet the mortgage on his home. He's from Houston and was part of the post-World War II migration of African Americans to to urban areas out of the South (the novel is set in 1948)--not a licensed private eye.

He is also fearful--of being killed by white cops, of some of his own friends, and of the fact that, even back then, someone minding his own business could be randomly killed in South LA. But he won't let himself be dominated by his fears, refusing to cower before powerful white men who try to force him into subservience, or to black men to whom violence is a casual companion. He faces the fears and does what he thinks is best regardless--being afraid and facing that fear is perhaps more brave than the bravado one sees in other hard-boiled detectives.

He is also unsure how to act. Whereas the other detective's unswerving moral code acts like a computer, spitting out the "right" answer, Easy has to think about what's going on, mull over decisions, and try and figure out what's "best." Often, there's no "good" answer, and he must choose between two bad choices and try and figure out which will do the least damage to the fewest people. Easy tries to do the right thing, but the world he lives in a far less clear cut than those of some other hard boiled detectives. He's also flawed and occassional makes mistakes, often when he's angry or tired--making him a character that more readers can relate to.

He also doesn't wise crack. It would not have been plausible for Easy to talk the way Philip Marlow (Chandler's here) did, smarting off to cops, teaking gangsters, baiting everyone. The social forces exerted on black men in 1948 were far different from those on white men (as they are today). That doesn't mean Easy isn't aumusing or that there isn't snappy dialogue (but a lot of it is internal, what he's thinking rather than what he says). I mention this because the "wise cracking private eye" is an expected part of the hard boiled genre, and this aspect of Easy's character is another way that the Easy Rawlins series isn't just another Chandler knock-off.
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However, violence is the thing that makes the Easy series the most unique I've read. The private eye's world is always a dark, dangerous place, but it's largely violence that the private eye seeks out. But Easy's whole world is dangerous; he fled Houston because he was implicated in a murder a friend had committed; in the Today of the novel, men with guns and knives are a daily part of life.

Easy, however, doesn't carry a gun. With other private eyes, the gun is more than an accessory, it's a sidekick, a main character in the book. Race Williams always mentions his forty-four, and Spenser talks about dressing warm so his bullets won't get cold. But Easy doesn't "pack," and he only has a gun in his hand in one sequence in the novel. He also doesn't kill any one--most private eyes wind up shooting the bad buys. People get dead at the end of Devil in a Blue Dress, but it isn't easy who does the killing.

It's not becuase Easy is squeamish. He's a World War II vet who saw a great deal of combat; he's haunted at night by the faces of the men he's killed. But he doesn't carry a gun and, at least in the first novel in the series, he doesn't kill anyone (this is only the first I'v read, so I can't speak beyond it).

The African-American world of post-War Los Angeles. It's a mix of people from all over the country, all of whom have different reasons for having come to LA. It's a world of family men and working class people trying to get by, and of gangsters and hoods, and of white people who go into these neighborhoods for reasons that rarely benefit the people who live there.

Mosleys' writing is clear, engaging, and is rich in meaning while at the same time a "Fast read." I just read Parker's most recent Spenser novel a couple of weeks ago, and it dawned on me that one of the reasons I love those books is because Spenser, Hawk, and Susan never change--they are old friends I can count on. But the fact that Easy DOES change is the reason I LIKE Devil in a Blue Dress. Looks like I've made another 'friend.' ...more

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