The Little Death [Paperback]

Michael Nava (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 2003

Henry Rios is introduced as a troubled San Francisco public defender battling alcoholism and burnout. While investigating the murder of an old friend, he traces clues back to the man’s own wealthy family. It is here that we first encounter Henry Rios’s struggle to maintain his faith in a legal system caught between justice and corruption, a theme that will continue throughout the series.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This murder mystery about a gay public defender in the San Francisco area is distinguished by good writing and by skillful adaptation of the genre's traditions. Lawyer Henry Rios's loyalty to wealthy wastrel Hugh Paris, with whom he once had a brief affair, strongly recalls the male bonding in Raymond Chandler's classic The Long Goodbye. In both there is a sense of the protagonist as a lost soul trying to justify another person's existence and thereby his own. Through legal documents as much as police work, Rios tracks the murder's clues back to Hugh's family and its conflicts between old money and opportunists, both so greedy and eager to control the family fortune that they will sanction any form of legal trickery, corruption, even murder. Particularly striking is Nava's vision of the legal system as a true instrument of justiceignoring distinctions of position, wealth or sexual preference.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Michael Nava is the author of seven Henry Rios novels, five of which (Goldenboy, Howtown, The Hidden Law, The Death of Friends, and Rag and Bone) have been Lambda Literary Award winners. He is an attorney in private practice in San Francisco.

Product Details

• Paperback: 168 pages
• Publisher: Alyson Books (October 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1555838308
• ISBN-13: 978-1555838300
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.5 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #865,581 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Michael Nava is a lawyer and novelist. His Henry Rios novels, published between 1988 and 2000, followed the life and cases of a gay criminal defense lawyer in Los Angeles during the tumultous period of the AIDS epidemic and the movement for gay rights. In 2000, he was awarded the Whitehead Award for Lifetime Achievement in LGBT literature. Previously he was awarded six Lambda literary prizes. He is at work on an historical novel set before and during the Mexican Revolution.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Instantly grows on the reader, August 6, 2001

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Little Death (Paperback)

The Little Death, originally published in 1986, was the first of seven Henry Rios mysteries. The final episode, published in 2001, is entitled Rag and Bone. This series has earned Michael Nava four Lambda Literary Awards, and comparisons to some of the great writers, such as Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler. Nava says he began writing The Little Death while working at the Palo Alto, California jail when he was studying for his bar exams.

Henry Rios probably earns less than one-half of what he could earn in private industry as a public defender. He is gay, is an excellent lawyer, and is used to dealing with minor offenses until Hugh Paris is picked up as an alleged drunk. The police find two PCP cigarettes on Hugh, and he resists arrest. Henry was sent down from felony trials to arraignments, which means his boss thought he was burned out and needed a rest after his last murder trial. But Henry's life is about to change drastically once again when a nocturnal visit from Hugh Paris exposes Henry to love; loss; and deception:

"The elegant body was as white as marble. I could see a dark blue vein running up the length of his arm, and a jagged red mark just beneath his armpit where the needle went in. There were bruises on his chest. His head rested on a kind of pillow. Death had robbed his face of its seductive animation but I recognized him."

The Little Death is an exquisitely written dark little mystery that will pull at the reader's heartstrings. Henry Rios is smart, determined, and instantly grows on the reader as the kind of hero who is in keeping with today's world. Michael Nava keeps his story subtle and intelligent, and it is a joy to read. He is indeed within the ranks of the characters and plot geniuses who wrote in the first half of the twentieth century. He obviously deserves to be recognized as the great writer he is.

Henry Rios is someone the reader wants to know a lot more about. Michael Nava's craftsmanship is an English major's delight. Justice would be served if Mr. Nava's name appeared on the best seller's list. He has much to teach.

Shelley J. Glodowski, Reviewer

9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Nava Rules, June 30, 2000

By 

Daryn Malof "darmal5" (Cincinnati) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Little Death (Paperback)

Michael Nava became one of my favorite authors with this book. He tells a tight twisted mystery that leaves one guessing "whodunnit?" until the very end. Besides being a prolific mystery writer, Nava infuses his stories with a real world mentality that is absent from many other authors (but hey I love escapism as much as the next person!). The reader wanting to grow with Henry Rios (Nava's main character) needs to start here and read the other books in this series. You will come to love Henry for his battles, both personal and public, and become emotionally attached to the character when he sometimes loses. A dynamic book taht makes all of us ask the question "Why?" of the world around us.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good Job, November 18, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Little Death (Paperback)

Perhaps Nava's greatest accomplishment in this novel is that he makes his main character, attorney Henry Rios, compelling and so utterly human. We read as Henry endures personal and professional troubles and you actually root for him. The fact that he is gay is irrelevant; Henry could be anybody. Being gay is a part of him, but it doesn't define him, and maybe that's the best lesson anyone will take away from this novel.

The book does read as if it's a first novel. Though Nava delivers an excellent characterization of Henry, other characters are not so similarly defined. Bad guys abound in this work, and at times can be confusing. Further, it's hard to believe that Henry would risk his professional career and personal sanity because a friend of his, albeit a new lover, was murdered. Henry seems to have fallen in love very quickly with Hugh Paris, the object of his affection and the murder than beings to flesh out the plot. As thoughtful and steadfast as Henry is, this seems out of character. Maybe that's the point. Love makes you question everything.