The Long Fall by Walter Mosley

Walter Mosley is one of my favorite authors. He is well know for his Easy Rawlins series of detective novels, Of which Devil In A Blue Dress was made into a major motion picture with Denzel Washington playing Rawlins. Easy Rawlins is a west coast PI we have followed for 11 novels, starting with his return to Los Angeles after World War II. The novels were not only good detective stores, they were a great look at life in post-war, black Los Angeles, a world that Mosley painted vividly with a menagerie of interesting characters. The Long Fall, the first Leonid McGill mystery is Mosley's New York version of Easy Rawlins, but unfortunately without the history and cultural lessons. Set in modern day Manhattan, McGill is a PI who is trying to turn his life from crooked to slightly bent. He has been, "in the life" for most of his 50+ years, but is now trying to go straight. Unfortunately, his past is harder to escape than he would like.

The book opens with McGill getting a seemingly simple assignment to track down four men, who subsequently are murdered. This doesn't sit right with him, so he puts in a lot of extra time and effort trying to find out why, almost getting killed himself a few times. Along the way, we meet a broad spectrum of New York gangsters, politicians and other low lives that McGill must navigate to get answers. While not as rich as the Easy Rawlins series, the tension of an old school character in a modern world does makes for a good story and hopefully an interesting series to follow.