Editorial Content for Farewell, Amethystine: An Easy Rawlins Mystery
Contributors
Reviewer (text)
The year is 1970, and Ezekiel “Easy” Rawlins and his associates are contemplating the revolutionary spirit that has engulfed the United States. Easy is a successful private detective who has investigated numerous cases in the Southland of California, where corruption and the excess of human vices are often on display. The arrival of a new client postpones the discussion of the pros and cons of social change. Amethystine “Amy” Stoller seeks Easy’s help in locating her ex-husband, Curt Fields, who has a gift for numbers.
Upon meeting Amethystine, Easy’s mind recalls an earlier time in his life and the love who got away. These remembrances begin to recur as complications arise with his latest case. Easy meets with Curt’s parents in order to glean pertinent information but is flummoxed when they appear clueless as to their son’s life. His woes are compounded when he learns that a friend who is a Commander in the LAPD is missing and might be in legal jeopardy. Easy is now pulling double duty in his sleuthing and looking for any leads that may prove fruitful.
"Walter Mosley brings a winning formula of the dramatic, enigmatic and poignant in crafting a cogent tale. Easy Rawlins is a genuine salt-of-the-earth character whose adventures never fail to excite the reader’s interest."
When Easy finds Curt’s body, his inquiries take on a greater urgency. He believes that Amethystine is holding information from him. Local cops are more than eager to pin the murder on Easy. Desperately in need of allies, he reaches out to his friend, Fearless Jones. Fearless is a war veteran like Easy, and his loyalty is unquestioned. Easy needs the mind of his LAPD buddy, Melvin Suggs, and knows that Fearless can provide extra muscle if necessary.
The perils that Easy faces are inconspicuous but are present as each case develops further. He will need to be as sharp as ever to avoid becoming a victim in either case as money, power and secrets are all worth killing for in the City of Angels.
FAREWELL, AMETHYSTINE is the latest arresting mystery from the fertile mind of Walter Mosley. This is the 16th novel to feature Easy Rawlins, and the seasoned gumshoe hasn’t lost a step, despite facing cases with many wrinkles. Easy is a tenacious investigator undeterred by the menace of a thug or the seductions of a femme fatale. His love of his family and devotion to his friends are just a couple of his admirable characteristics.
Easy lives in a Los Angeles that still bears fresh wounds from racial unrest in the preceding years, and the LAPD remains quick to clamp down on the civil rights of those they view as the enemy. Mosley deftly portrays the tense interactions between Easy and the often uncivil members of the police department. The women who figure prominently in the narrative are intelligent, sultry and occasionally dangerous, and they serve as possible foils to Easy’s successful resolution of his cases.
Walter Mosley brings a winning formula of the dramatic, enigmatic and poignant in crafting a cogent tale. Easy Rawlins is a genuine salt-of-the-earth character whose adventures never fail to excite the reader’s interest.
Teaser
January 1970. Ezekiel “Easy” Rawlins, LA’s premier Black detective, has a loving family, a beautiful home and a thriving investigation agency at 50 years old. All is right with the world…and then Amethystine Stoller, his own personal Helen of Troy, arrives. Her ex-husband is missing, which is a simple enough case. But even as Easy takes his first step in the investigation, he trips. He falls into the memory of things past --- little things, like loss, love, a world war, and a hunger that has eaten at him since he was a Black boy on his own on the streets of Fifth Ward, Houston, Texas. The missing ex, a young white man named Curt Fields, is found dead. Easy’s only real friend in the LAPD, Melvin Suggs, has gone into hiding rather than allow his femme fatale wife to go to the gas chamber. And that’s only the beginning. Easy finds himself pressed into a reckoning.
Promo
January 1970. Ezekiel “Easy” Rawlins, LA’s premier Black detective, has a loving family, a beautiful home and a thriving investigation agency at 50 years old. All is right with the world…and then Amethystine Stoller, his own personal Helen of Troy, arrives. Her ex-husband is missing, which is a simple enough case. But even as Easy takes his first step in the investigation, he trips. He falls into the memory of things past --- little things, like loss, love, a world war, and a hunger that has eaten at him since he was a Black boy on his own on the streets of Fifth Ward, Houston, Texas. The missing ex, a young white man named Curt Fields, is found dead. Easy’s only real friend in the LAPD, Melvin Suggs, has gone into hiding rather than allow his femme fatale wife to go to the gas chamber. And that’s only the beginning. Easy finds himself pressed into a reckoning.
About the Book
From “master of the genre” (Washington Post) Walter Mosley, Detective Easy Rawlins’ latest client sends him down a warren of memory and nostalgia --- blinding him to reason and risk.
January 1970 finds Ezekiel “Easy” Rawlins, LA’s premier Black detective, at 50 years of age despite all expectations. He has a loving family, a beautiful home and a thriving investigation agency. All is right with the world…and then Amethystine Stoller, his own personal Helen of Troy, arrives. Her ex-husband is missing. A simple enough case. But even as Easy takes his first step in the investigation he trips. He falls into the memory of things past. Little things, like loss, love, a world war, and a hunger that has eaten at him since he was a Black boy on his own on the streets of Fifth Ward, Houston, Texas.
The missing ex, a young white man named Curt Fields, is found dead. Easy’s only real friend in the LAPD, Melvin Suggs, has gone into hiding rather than allow his femme fatale wife to go to the gas chamber. And that’s only the beginning.
Easy finds himself pressed into a reckoning. All of his success cannot succor his heart. The 1970s have ushered in new expectations of men and women, Black and white, and Easy has to make a choice that will almost certainly hasten a permanent descent, one that might sunder his soul.
Audiobook available, read by Michael Boatman
