Many know Walter Mosley's Easy Rawlins series (and if you don't, you should), but what do you do when you've finished Rose Gold and are looking for more? Walter Mosley writes highly atmospheric novels set on the gritty streets of LA in the latter half of the 20th century. His character Rawlins doesn't have a badge, he does favors for people. In Rose Gold, the latest, he gets involved with an abduction that pulls in the FBI and the CIA. Fortunately, there are more books to satisfy you until the next installment.
Nelson George may not be a household name, but he has quite the hip hop pedigree as a nonfiction author and producer of the Hip Hop Honors television program. He has written two noir novels, the start of a series. In The Plot Against Hip Hop, we are introduced to D Hunter, who has a security company specializing in musical clients. When his mentor dies in his arms from a stabbing written off by the police as a gang initiation, D starts an investigation of his own. The Lost Treasures of R&B finds D involved in an arms deal gone bad and the hunt for the rarest of the rare: a vinyl record of a jam featuring the best of Motown and Memphis soul. George is very good at giving his stories the ring of truth, whether in the street-smart dialog, the descriptions of locations, or name-dropping of celebrities. There are also ruminations about the gentrification of Brooklyn and where the idea of high rise public housing projects came from. Hopefully, this series will run as long as that of the better-known Easy Rawlins.
Dead by Popular Demand by Teddy Hayes is set in Harlem and also deals with the music industry. Devil Barnett is ex-CIA, come home to tend his late father's bar and escape the glass ceiling at his former employer. When two members of a popular British rap group are murdered, the uncle of one of the victims asks Devil to look into it. He does, and administers some street justice along the way. This book is a sequel to Blood Red Blues, where Devil gets involved in an investigation of a killing in a sleazy bar with political repercussions. While these books are gritty, they rise above ghetto clichés with humor and a few twists, such as Barnett's sickle cell anemia and what he has to do to keep it under control (hint: no stress).
Like the Easy Rawlins series, Ray Shannon's Man Eater takes place in LA, but in a decidedly glitzier neighborhood. Ronnie Deal is a movie executive who stops killer Neon Polk from beating a victim. In order to keep from being stabbed in the back literally as well as figuratively, she makes a deal with budding African American screenwriter Ellis Langford: help her kill Polk, and she will buy Langford's screenplay. There's a large cast, but Shannon manages to keep all his plates in the air. Also recommended for fans of Elmore Leonard; if you liked Get Shorty, you should like this.
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