From a ‘Devil in a Blue Dress’ to ‘Blood Grove’, ranking the Easy Rawlins series
I really don’t know when I began the journey with Ezekiel Porterhouse Rawlins. The film version of ‘Devil in a Blue Dress’ starring Denzel with a wonderful appearance by Don Cheadle was released in 1995 – five years after the publication of the book it was based on. So at least the world was familiar with Easy that far back; it was a little later for me but being someone who is big on source material, it was inevitable that I would pick up the book.
When that occurred, I don’t recall but once I began, I knew that I would continue on until the series end and that ended – for the time being – with 2021’s Blood Grove. Over two years after the publication of Blood Grove, I completed all 15 books, reading the final eight in a four month span.
Following is my ranking of all 15 Rawlins mysteries. A few notes beforehand: the rankings are rapid reactions after one read (and no notes which was a blunder on my part), which means that when I revisit the series in five years, the rankings will be subject to change.
One of the books, Gone Fishin‘, serve as a prequel of sorts. It’s the one non-mystery story of the series.
Thematically, the series doesn’t evolve. Despite the series expanding 21 years of Easy’s life, Walter Mosley, the author of the Rawlins series, wrote about the same plight for Easy. Look, as a black man in America, I know that we have dealt with the same eight ball since the first Englishmen settled the land but it made the stories a bit redundant. Easy never fully shook the police – despite being the consultant to the Special Assistant to the Commissioner – and when there’s a case, there’s a woman as the driving force behind it.
Final note, Mosley had an opportunity to explore a much grander topic. In Little Scarlet, the narrative opened:
The morning air smelled of smoke. Wood ash mainly but there was also the acrid stench of burnt plastic and paint. And even though I knew it couldn’t be true, I thought I caught a whiff of putrid flesh from under the rubble across the street.
The backdrop of Little Scarlet was the Watts riots of 1965 and even though I have it as the second best story of the series, the riots – or the immediate aftermath in this case – could’ve been more of a character than the setting.
The books are listed in chronological order. My rankings are the bracketed number.
- Devil in a Blue [1]
- A Red Death [14]
- White Butterfly [3]
- Black Betty [6]
- A Little Yellow Dog [8]
- Gone Fishin’ [4]
- Bad Boy Brawly Brown [11]
- Six Easy Pieces*
- Little Scarlet [2]
- Cinnamon Kiss [12]
- Blonde Faith [7]
- Little Green [13]
- Rose Gold [10]
- Charcoal Joe [9]
- Blood Grove [5]
*Six Easy Pieces is a collection of short stories that move Easy’s life along. I didn’t want to rate the collection, however the final story within the collection, “Amber Gate, directly ties-in to Little Scarlet.
Grisham attempts a 3 with ‘Sooley’, but manages just a free throw
I first became aware of John Grisham’s newest novel Sooley one day as perused the Barnes and Noble website and read that the protagonist is a basketball player for North Carolina Central University. NCCU is kind of dear to my heart; I’m not a Central alum but five members of my family are a part of Eagle Nation so the idea of Grisham choosing Central’s men’s basketball program – fresh off of the heels of their docuseries ‘Why Not Us’ – made Sooley an instant must read.
Sooley is the nickname given to Samuel Sooleymon, a South Sudanese teenager whose basketball prowess – and a coach’s favor – landed him in Durham with a scholarship. Samuel turned what began as a redshirt season into legend as he led the Eagles to historic heights all while his family have their own tribulations back home in the “bush.”
As a career sportswriter, I know more than anybody that what makes a great sports story is what occurs off the field, the development of the characters that become our idols on it. Especially in a novel where you have more words to present readers with the intricacies of why we transform these figures into sports superstars. Grisham missed the shot with Sooley.
Grisham used a rather bland sport cliché of using an athlete from an African nation to be our protagonist. Cliché is a bit harsh of a term but there have been numerous of athletes from Africa who have found their way out of their precarious plights of their country through America’s sports pipeline. (Manute Bol himself is a Sudanese; Hall of Famer Hakeem Olajuwon is a native of Nigeria.) Samuel’s path to Central, which was detailed in Part 1 of the novel, gives off a bit of ‘seen this plenty of times before’ vibe making it as boring as the Spurs offense. The story becomes good towards the end of Part 1 when Grisham meshed Samuel’s ascension as an American college athlete and the descension of Samuel’s family (his mother Beatrice and brothers James and Chol) back in Lotta, South Sudan which became the heart of the story from Part 2 on (the novel is broken into three parts).
Sooley wasn’t able to maintain the momentum, however, despite there being some comical college athlete moments, such as when Samuel’s roommate and best friend Murray (Sooley is also Murray’s story) was dumped by his girlfriend Robin.
Sooley suspected that the truth was that Robin had slept with several athletes, and he was secretly thrilled that she was out of the picture. … Sooley’s phone buzzed quietly. He looked at the screen and was horrified to see a text from Robin: I still wanna c u naked.
He put the phone under his pillow and stretched out on his bed.
Women!
page 188 from “Sooley”
And although Grisham’s commentary highlighting the impact of civil wars on the lives of citizens, how it splinters families and the hardships of refugees and immigration painted a vivid picture of a much larger weight that Samuel, and others from war torn nations carry on their shoulders as they focus to use athletics in America to make the lives better for everyone, the payoff failed when Grisham decided to not allow Samuel to see the seeds of his determination bear fruit.
Sooley is the third sports themed novel from Grisham that I’ve read – Bleachers being one of my favorite novels of all time – but unfortunately, it is more of a layup than a slam dunk.
⭐⭐⭐
The NRA and the NFL have more in common besides the ‘N’
What an eventful Saturday, Nov. 16, 2019 became.
The story that should’ve been getting all of the traction was the injury to Heisman hopeful and potential No. 1 pick of the National Football League draft, Alabama quarterback Tua Tagovailoa. A severe hip injury, Tagovailoa’s NFL career could be over before it began which, off of the heels of the NCAA saying that they will now allow athletes to be compensated for their likeness in 2021, is yet another example as to why college athletes getting paid their worth is paramount.
But alas, it was what happened at a Atlanta high school football field that stole all of the headlines.
There’s a beauty about being observant; sitting in the background, ears and eyes open and mouth closed, you get a chance to decipher the noise and come up with a more astute observation than reacting on emotion just to be the first to give an opinion. Over the previous 48 hours as of this posting, there had been a lot of sports pundits opining about the sham that was the NFL’s workout for former Super Bowl quarterback Colin Kaepernick. A select few, who wear the same skin complexion as my own, have placed blame on Kaepernick for the workout fiasco.
I completely get it. For someone that has been begging and pleading to re-enter the League it is up to that individual to ‘get in line.’ So of course it’s Kaepernick’s fault for not acquiescing to the NFL despite the workout being hastily thrown together from out of the blue with what is to be believed to have been a ‘hand over your rights’ waiver. Because if it really is about playing football again, Kaepernick would have bowed down like Kunte Kinte before the whip toting massa and say ‘Yes sir boss. Whatever you say sir boss.’
That propaganda made it even more apparent to me just how powerful the NFL is and that I’ve only seen such power from one other faction — the National Rifle Association.
As far as dollars go, the NFL is worth billions which supersedes what the NRA hauls in but the NRA, according to ‘Business Insider’ spent $5.1 million on gun rights advocacy in 2017, with 89 percent of that donated to the Republican Party. A study by the Center for Responsive Politics showed that the NRA spent nearly $10 million in support of the current President during his 2016 campaign. As far as the NFL, well, ESPN’s deal with the League is $15.2 billion. Hell, Fox paid the NFL $3.3 billion just for Thursday night football.
But despite another school shooting and a gunman murdering people a day before this posting, we have mental health issues instead of gun issues just as we have a Kaepernick issue instead of an NFL issue (at least as far as this particular workout is concerned).
Both the NFL and the NRA are too powerful to blame for their atrocities; money so long that commentators go all Thomas D. Rice; money so long that even when the book is obvious, they will always hold the ‘Big Joker.’
CDreamz 