Walter Mosley

"Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned," by Walter Mosley. Norton. 208 pages. $23.Violence haunts every corner of Walter Mosley's newest novel. It permeates the characters. It dribbles over scenes. It becomes an ethic unto itself.In spite of myself, I like "Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned." I like it very much and I admire the killer hero, Socrates Fortlow. His solutions, his observations, his friendships have their origins in the primordial ooze. In my weary world, they seem fretfully reasonable.

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WASHINGTON -- Walter Mosley is in a very good place.First of all, he is in the chapel of a handsome Episcopalian church, the pews almost Easter Sunday full with fans of his mystery books and last year's non-genre novel, "RL's Dream." He also is on the lower rungs of several best-seller lists with his latest Easy Rawlins book, "A Little Yellow Dog" (Norton, $23).Consequently, he is on the lower rungs of writing fame, which he proclaims the best place of all, a place that allows him to still get out and meet his fans, without feeling overwhelmed.

Age hasn't made Walter Mosley any less adventurous. The 56-year-old cut his teeth writing crime fiction; his historical series with detective Ezekiel "Easy" Rawlins spanned 11 books and established Mosley as a best-selling author. But in the past decade, Mosley has veered into other genres, including nonfiction, erotica and science fiction. His latest book, The Tempest Tales, follows main character Tempest Landry on his journey to heaven and back. Mosley will be at the Baltimore Book Festival this weekend in support of it. He will speak at 2 p.m. Sunday at the Literary Salon.

"Well, look at this," Walter Mosley said as he was handed a first-edition copy of his debut crime novel, "Devil in a Blue Dress." "You know, I've heard in Los Angeles that signed first editions of this book go for $250-$260 now."Mr. Mosley smiled as he returned the book to James French, a crime laboratory supervisor for the Baltimore City Police, who carefully placed the book and signed copies of Mr. Mosley's other two novels in a bag. "Don't worry," Mr. French assured the writer. "I'm hanging on to these ones."

Age hasn't made Walter Mosley any less adventurous. The 56-year-old cut his teeth writing crime fiction; his historical series with detective Ezekiel "Easy" Rawlins spanned 11 books and established Mosley as a best-selling author. But in the past decade, Mosley has veered into other genres, including nonfiction, erotica and science fiction. His latest book, The Tempest Tales, follows main character Tempest Landry on his journey to heaven and back. Mosley will be at the Baltimore Book Festival this weekend in support of it. He will speak at 2 p.m. Sunday at the Literary Salon.

When we last saw publisher W. Paul Coates, it was almost a year ago to the day and he was cruising the snowy streets of Brooklyn, N.Y., in Walter Mosley's hired car, starting off on a heady entrepreneurial journey that ultimately could make or break his business, Black Classic Press.Mosley, the best-selling author of the acclaimed Easy Rawlings detective series, had decided to give a small press the rights to his unpublished first novel, "Gone Fishin'." The potential gains were so high -- a national best seller, six-figure paperback sale, foreign rights -- that Coates burst into tears when he learned he had been chosen.

I'll tell you what. I give ya fifteen dollars t'drive me to Pariah fo'a couple'a days . . . Yeah, man, I ain't lyin'.''Let's see it.'Mouse got that wary dog look again and said in a quiet voice, 'I ain't never asked you to prove nuthin', Easy.'"From Walter Mosley's new book, "Gone Fishin' "Two men are going on a trip. They climb into a '95 Lincoln Town Car, a blue so dark it looks black on this snowy night in Greenwich Village. As the driver heads south, the two men chat easily about their mutual business in the half-sentences and unfinished thoughts common to long friendships, though their friendship is not a particularly long one.The car pulls up outside Nkiru, a book store in Brooklyn's Park Slope neighborhood.

"Walkin' the Dog," by Walter Mosley. Little Brown & Co. 288 pages. $24.95. Socrates Fortlow returns in Walter Mosley's new novel. The book is a good read, but like most sequels it lacks the grit and fire that made its predecessor "Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned" a standout story. By the end of the sequel, one wonders what is left to say about what had been one of Mosley's most engaging characters.

I'm having tremendous fun reading three Walter Mosley books: "White Butterfly," "Red Death," and the one we're going to publish, "Gone Fishin'."I orginally looked at them for character development, but I didn't realize it would be so clear and illuminating to read them all at the same time. It allows me to see the consistency between the characters and I came across details I missed the first time I read them.I'm also stumbling through one of my favorite histories, John William Draper's "Intellectual Development of Europe."

Blonde Faith An Easy Rawlins Novel By Walter Mosley Little, Brown / 308 pages / $25.99 For two decades, Easy Rawlins has walked the streets of Los Angeles, and the city has given him everything: friends, family, two homes, three apartment buildings, a dog and any number of people willing to pay him to fix their broken lives. Yet something's gone wrong. Two years after the riots, Watts smolders, Vietnam rages and Easy is losing it. He knows it. His friends know it. And, of course, Walter Mosley knows it. The 10th Easy Rawlins novel is unlike any we've read.

Fear of the Dark: A Novel Walter Mosley Little, Brown / 312 pages / $25.99 "I was expecting one kind of trouble when another came knocking at my door," begins Fear of the Dark, the third in Walter Mosley's series featuring Paris Minton and Fearless Jones, reminding us again that this author is a genius of the first sentence. The setting is South Los Angeles, the time is 1956, and the trouble is Paris' cousin, Ulysses S. Grant IV. Paris, used-book seller and self-confessed milquetoast, knows from bitter experience that Ulysses, more usually known as Useless, brings trouble "like an infection."

Fortunate Son: A Novel Walter Mosley Little, Brown & Co. / 320 pages / $23.95 Branwyn Beerman smiles at Thomas, her 6-year-old son, who remains perfectly still because he doesn't want to scare her away. "What have they done to you, baby?" she asks. Is Thomas dreaming? Is he having an out-of-body experience? Is his mother a ghost watching over him "through rain and shine," as she promised just before her untimely death several weeks earlier? Yes to all three. Everything's possible in Walter Mosley's most recent novel, Fortunate Son, where love transcends all boundaries, even those separating the living from the dead.

CINNAMON KISS Walter Mosley Little, Brown / 308 pages. Reviewing books is hardly an objective pursuit, but it's made more subjective when trying to measure a writer's potential for posterity. Walter Mosley's was established almost as soon as he introduced his signature protagonist, Easy Rawlins, a decade and a half ago. Now, with Cinnamon Kiss, Easy hasmoved forward almost 20 years, surviving riots, racial tensions and thorny relationships in achieving a complex balance. When he is asked to investigate the disappearance of a prominent lawyer and his unsettlingly beautiful assistant (and possible lover)

"Walkin' the Dog," by Walter Mosley. Little Brown & Co. 288 pages. $24.95. Socrates Fortlow returns in Walter Mosley's new novel. The book is a good read, but like most sequels it lacks the grit and fire that made its predecessor "Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned" a standout story. By the end of the sequel, one wonders what is left to say about what had been one of Mosley's most engaging characters.

When we last saw publisher W. Paul Coates, it was almost a year ago to the day and he was cruising the snowy streets of Brooklyn, N.Y., in Walter Mosley's hired car, starting off on a heady entrepreneurial journey that ultimately could make or break his business, Black Classic Press.Mosley, the best-selling author of the acclaimed Easy Rawlings detective series, had decided to give a small press the rights to his unpublished first novel, "Gone Fishin'." The potential gains were so high -- a national best seller, six-figure paperback sale, foreign rights -- that Coates burst into tears when he learned he had been chosen.

"A Little Yellow Dog," by Walter Mosley. Norton. 288 pages. $23.Easy Rawlins is a black man in the tense years leading up to the civil rights movement. That alone is enough to earn him the constant attention of police. Plus, he's always "doing favors" for folks in sticky situations, which usually wind up with someone trying to kill him.The author's latest book is murder, intrigue, sex, a fine historical perspective and a dash of wisdom.Pub Date: 7/14/96

"RL's Dream," by Walter Mosley. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. 267 pages. $22 Walter Mosley does not disappoint. In this, his latest novel and first venture into non-genre fiction, Mr. Mosley keeps the pace up, the pages turning, in a tale of the Mississippi blues and what made the blues the blues: black life in the deep South before the era of civil rights.And so it goes. "Robert Johnson's blues would rip the skin right off yo' back. Robert Johnson's blues get down to a nerve most people don't even have no more.

"Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned," by Walter Mosley. Norton. 208 pages. $23.Violence haunts every corner of Walter Mosley's newest novel. It permeates the characters. It dribbles over scenes. It becomes an ethic unto itself.In spite of myself, I like "Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned." I like it very much and I admire the killer hero, Socrates Fortlow. His solutions, his observations, his friendships have their origins in the primordial ooze. In my weary world, they seem fretfully reasonable.

I'll tell you what. I give ya fifteen dollars t'drive me to Pariah fo'a couple'a days . . . Yeah, man, I ain't lyin'.''Let's see it.'Mouse got that wary dog look again and said in a quiet voice, 'I ain't never asked you to prove nuthin', Easy.'"From Walter Mosley's new book, "Gone Fishin' "Two men are going on a trip. They climb into a '95 Lincoln Town Car, a blue so dark it looks black on this snowy night in Greenwich Village. As the driver heads south, the two men chat easily about their mutual business in the half-sentences and unfinished thoughts common to long friendships, though their friendship is not a particularly long one.The car pulls up outside Nkiru, a book store in Brooklyn's Park Slope neighborhood.