BOOK 172: DEVIL IN A BLUE DRESS:
WALTER MOSLEY
This is a 1990 hardboiled
mystery
novel by Walter Mosley, his first published book. The text centers on
the main character, Ezekiel "Easy" Rawlins, and his transformation from
a day laborer into a detective.
Set in 1948, in the Watts area of
Los Angeles, the story begins with Easy out-of-work and unable to pay his
mortgage. He is sitting in a bar run by Joppy, a friend from Texas, when a man
named DeWitt Albright walks into the bar and offers him a job finding a young
woman named Daphne Monet. Monet, a young white woman, is rumored to be hanging
out in bars frequented mostly by African Americans, although white women are
allowed inside.
The book was adapted into a 1995 film of the same name, which starred Denzel
Washington as Easy Rawlins, and also featured Jennifer Beals,
Tom Sizemore,
Maury Chaykin,
and Don
Cheadle as the unhinged "Mouse."
