Walter Mosley: Devil in a Blue Dress
Mar. 5th, 2009 03:22 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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50books_poc18: Walter Mosley: Devil in a Blue Dress
This is a really good noir novel, written in 1990 but set in 1948 about the black war veteran Easy Rawlings being hired to solve a case which gets nastier and more complicated the more he pokes at it. I saw the movie a few years ago so knew the twist but it's complicated enough that I'd forgotten all the other details of the plot and was still a little confused at the end. (I do have a headache though :))
It's easy to read and very engaging, and manages the perfect noir mix of gritty realism and lyrical moodiness. Noir is one of those genres which I both enjoy and find a little annoying so I didn't love the book but that wasn't due to any actual flaws I could see. The portrait of late 40s American race attitudes was very effective (and undercut the traditional White Hero noir narrative), and it didn't give the creepy exploitative feel I get from a lot of other period/subculture etc crime stories (eg CSI/Burn Notice and their "Freaky subculture who brought their damnation on themselves by being so freaky- of the week" format)
This is a really good noir novel, written in 1990 but set in 1948 about the black war veteran Easy Rawlings being hired to solve a case which gets nastier and more complicated the more he pokes at it. I saw the movie a few years ago so knew the twist but it's complicated enough that I'd forgotten all the other details of the plot and was still a little confused at the end. (I do have a headache though :))
It's easy to read and very engaging, and manages the perfect noir mix of gritty realism and lyrical moodiness. Noir is one of those genres which I both enjoy and find a little annoying so I didn't love the book but that wasn't due to any actual flaws I could see. The portrait of late 40s American race attitudes was very effective (and undercut the traditional White Hero noir narrative), and it didn't give the creepy exploitative feel I get from a lot of other period/subculture etc crime stories (eg CSI/Burn Notice and their "Freaky subculture who brought their damnation on themselves by being so freaky- of the week" format)
