A Red Death : Featuring an Original Easy Rawlins Short Story "Silver Lining" (Paperback)

by Walter Mosley (Author) "I ALWAYS STARTED SWEEPING ON THE TOP FLOOR OF THE Magnolia Street apartments..." (more)
Key Phrases: little yellow dog, red death, First African, Agent Craxton, Chaim Wenzler (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Mosley's second novel (after Devil in a Blue Dress ) confirms the advent of an extraordinary storyteller. It is five years after the events detailed in the first novel and Easy Rawlins has used the stolen money he kept back in 1948 to purchase a pair of L.A. apartment buildings. There he masquerades as the janitor, quietly enjoying the fruits of ownership and dabbling in private investigation. But he is suddenly in the grip of powerful government forces. When the IRS wants to know where Easy got the money to become a landlord, Easy's sole recourse is to agree to work undercover for the FBI on a witch-hunt to net Reds. The situation presents only the first of the moral dilemmas here: Easy's remorseless, deadly best friend, Mouse, has come to L.A. in pursuit of his ex-wife, EttaMae, who has fled with their young son. Etta, however, is the only woman Easy has ever loved, and she is more than willing to reciprocate--at least on the physical level. Solid and entertaining, the story nonetheless remains secondary to the portrait of a time and a place, to the indelible reality of Easy Rawlins, a black man in a world not yet ready to accept him. Mosley, with his unique talents, may well be in the process of creating a genre classic. BOMC, QPB and Mysterious Book Club selections.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal
Mosley's unique narrative voice ( Devil in a Blue Dress , LJ 6/1/90) reappears in the appealing person of Easy Rawlins, an astute and tough war veteran living in early 1950s Los Angeles. In deep trouble with the IRS for nonpayment of taxes, Easy half-heartedly agrees to spy on a suspected Jewish Communist for an avid FBI agent in return for leverage with the tax man. As before, Mosley's inclusion of life in Watts, contemporary social attitudes, and colloquial speech contribute to the excellence and authenticity of plot and character portrayal. Easy to take.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: Washington Square Press (October 15, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0743451767
• ISBN-13: 978-0743451765
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #192,485 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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• This is item 2 in The Easy Rawlins Series.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A window into a very different world, November 14, 2000

By	Carol Peterson Hennekens (Colorado Springs, CO United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A RED DEATH (Easy Rawlins Mysteries) (Paperback)

One of the great things about fiction is that not only do you get the fun of plot and characters, sometimes you really can learn something. This book really opened the eyes of both my husband and I about the world of 1950's Watts and the whole red-baiting McCarthyism scene. Pretty scary stuff but a good thing for two white boomers.

EZ Rawlins continues to grown as a character. Clay's narration on the unaudited tape is terrific. The side characters are pretty interesting. The plot is solid and has a dandy twist at the end. Still, what lingers with me is the scenes of black life - the churches, the bars, EZ's wisdom on concealing his wealth.

A good read if you like mysteries and/or are interested in a look at African-American culture from a point of view other than the Oprah books.

13 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars The Blaxploitation Movie's Daddy, July 6, 2004

By	Spri "American Hero" (NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Red Death (Mass Market Paperback)

Even though Mosley's popular whodunnits started taking shape in the 90's, it's easy to see that the stories he writes stemmed from a certain influence:

Shaft, maybe even Black Ceasar, et al. for the action and "givin' it to da man!" undertones. Mixed in with a little bit of "Cotton Comes to Harlem" and "Mohagany" for the occasional romance and levity. In fact, his works don't seem much different than what you would see on the 1973 big screen in a theatre packed to the back with black faces. Note the similarities...

1. You've got your classic hard brother, be he a private dick or just a good guy out to get what's coming to him. Easy, in classic Easy fashion, is a guy trying not to do what's wrong because he's seen enough of that. A hard drinker because of the pain his past has caused him, this fellow with kill only if he has to.

2. There's always the white folks who turn out to be the bad guys. They're cops or ganglords or jerks with a ton of dough. Here we have Lawrence, a tax agent who comes down on Easy because of tax evasion. Second we have Craxton, the FBI guy who wants to use Easy for his own purposes, but makes a deal with him - do my bidding and I'll chill out that tax thing. Finally, there is Officer Fine, a bit player who lusts after the cries and screams of anything black.

3. Can't forget how nobody else "understands him but his woman." And she's black, no way around that. With Easy, he's messing around with a woman who can get him killed as sure as the day is long: Mouse's wife. Now if that's not a mistake, I don't know what is. Mouse is Easy's friend, for one thing. For another, he's a cold-blooded killer. But Easy's willing to risk it all for love.

4. Must mention the white woman he cheats on her with. This is thrown in soley to annoy the white man. In 1970, this act of spite was a given. And it's in this book too.

5. Jive talk. Nothing but jive talk. It simply must be indicative of the era and this novel plays out perfectly as a piece choc full of blacks who were taught how to talk by their 1930's parents, who were taught to talk by THEIR 1900 former slave parents, who, before that, were educated in grammer and English by Africans who weren't even born here and ignorant overssers. Mosley is obviously no stranger to this snowball effect that whites have come to call "ebonics." As the credo goes, "write what you know."

6. The hard brother has to be a vigilante type. No way is he an angel. Easy has taken lives and he regrets it. He drinks like it's going out of style and he needs it. He cheats The Man out of his money to keep things balanced. He can be a sinner, but he must be able to rationalize it believably or the reader (watcher) won't sympathize with him. No problem with that here.

So yeah, it's like a blaxploitation movie with one catch: the white friend. I've never seen that in the movies, yet I've read two of Mosley's books and in both he seems to project his antagonists with an affinity for Jews, similarizing their plights in doomed histories. This approach is effective in that it shows open hearts and opened minds during an era of rampant hate. I liked this book because I could identify with many of the characters, some of whom I am ashamed to say I feel like I've known well in my lifetime. But there's just something about the story that keeps it average...

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars There's much to enjoy and ponder..., March 16, 2000

By	[e-mail] (Hawyard, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Red Death (Easy Rawlins Mysteries) (Paperback)

Watts-1953 and everything's easy for Ezekiel Porterhouse "Easy" Rawlins. His real estate investments are doing well, he has good friends and finally has access to the woman of his dreams [downside: she's the estranged wife of his best friend!] Things become not so easy very quickly though as our protagonist attracts the attention of a zealous IRS agent, becomes a reluctant undercover agent for the FBI, loses one of his best and long time friends and finds himself a possible suspect in several murders. To clear himself and make peace with his inner world, he must find the killer[s].

Mosely guides his audience through various characters, locations and situations. What appeals to me about his writing, aside from the fluid use of language and imagery and the creation of believable, albeit complex characters, is his ability to distill and articulate certain thoughts as they existed in the minds black people in America in the 50's [if not today!]. Mosely writes about who and what he knows, just as Gresham knows the law and creates settings and situations based on his particular knowledge, so too Mosely. A Red Death is solid, colorful and entertaining storytelling. Take it, "Easy!"