The End of Easy?
by Robert C. Hahn -- Publishers Weekly, 12/31/2007
On October 10, Little, Brown published Blonde Faith, Walter Mosley’s 10th and possibly final novel to feature Los Angeles investigator Easy Rawlins.
Did you once say that the Easy Rawlins series would run five or perhaps seven books?
I messed around with that—sometimes I said nine.
What changed?
There were more books to write—there was more to say.
It would be easy for a reader to construe the ending of Blonde Faith as the final chapter in the Easy Rawlins saga. Is that your intent?
It’s certainly in my head. There are all kinds of things one could do. I could write about Easy earlier on. But I’m not thinking about writing any more Easy Rawlins books at this time.
It would be hard to name a character that works harder at family than Easy. Yet family is always slipping away from him.
Easy makes a lot of mistakes, like many of us do. And he tries to make up for it—and does in his own way. Easy lives a tragic life. You know my Fearless Jones series? If Paris Minton or Fearless saves you, you’re going to be saved, you’re going to be happy, you get some money, the bad guys are going to be whipped. If Easy saves you, your life will probably be worse than if you had died.
Do you think there’s an intrinsic difference between the way blacks and whites view family?
The problem with that question is you’re being a philosopher. You have to ask who’s white? Who’s black? A lot of people weren’t considered white in America for a long time. The Irish, for instance. So the question is interesting at first, but then it becomes kind of moot because all kinds of families are different. How you love and take care of people may have—and I’m not sure about this—more to do with class than with race.
You’ve written 28 books in less than two decades, including mysteries, science fiction, erotica, young adult and nonfiction.
One of the issues in America and in the modern world in general is that people feel they have to specialize. I think a fuller person is going to want to do all different kinds of work.
Are you touring with Blonde Faith?
I am. I don’t usually tour, but this one is very likely the last Easy, and I feel like I owe him something. I really feel that this is the best Easy Rawlins novel. It’s not that it’s my favorite book, but I think it’s my best novel. And I’ve never said that before.
