Fear of the Dark

Michael Boatman transports listeners to 1950s Los Angeles in Mosley's latest Fearless Jones mystery. Erudite Paris Minton--who is anything but "some negro bookseller"--is the perfect foil for Jones since he is as cowardly as the former Army assassin is fearless. As Boatman unfolds the trail of murder, blackmail, and theft, the nature of villains, racists, an evil-eyed mother, and grieving hit men, among other characters, are all hauntingly, sharply, even elegantly unveiled. An undercurrent of racism can be heard in the voices of cops, blackmailed businessmen, and Asian citizens recovering from the impact of war. Haunting period melodies mark chapter closings, reminiscent of a classic radio serial. D.P.D. (c) AudioFile 2007, Portland, Maine

July 31, 2006
Though the prose is a bit rough in spots, Mosley's third outing for L.A. bookseller Paris Minton and the intrepid Fearless Jones is as entertaining as its predecessors, Fearless Jones
and Fear Itself
. Trouble comes to Paris's door in the form of his cousin Ulysses "Useless" S. Grant IV," who needs help after getting mixed up in a scheme that has gotten totally out of hand. Despite refusing to even let Useless cross his threshold, Paris is drawn, violently, into the fray. Mosley isn't afraid to cast his characters in heroic molds and does so explicitly when Paris recalls Bullfinch's
Mythology
and muses: "Fearless was the hero, I was the hero's companion, Useless was the mischievous trickster." As in any good heroic adventure, Fearless and Paris face a variety of monsters, traps, sirens and other temptations. Mosley's talent for sketching memorable minor characters of every hue ("buttery brown," "copper," "brick," "olive with a hint of lemon") is fully evident, while his reading of the racial temperature of the 1950s is as dead-on as ever.