FEBRUARY 2020 - AudioFile
Dion Graham offers an amazing performance of Edgar Award-winning Walter Mosley’s sixth P.I. Leonid McGill outing in the badass world of crime and criminals. His dubious past allows Leonid entrée into places where upstanding citizens wouldn’t go. “Catfish” Worry, a 94-year-old black blues musician, asks Leonid to deliver a letter to a seemingly white billionaire’s daughter before her wedding, letting her know that her father is his son. Leonid finds himself embroiled in a tangled web of secrets and deceit, gunmen and assassins. Graham delivers Mosley’s noir mystery with his usual excellence, giving each character an individual personality. His women are always respectfully treated, never stereotypes, while his gangsters are frighteningly real. With his mastery of dialects and tone, Graham delivers suspense best listened to. S.J.H. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award, 2021 Audies Finalist © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine
From the Publisher
"This gifted raconteur of the African American experience has produced an absorbing noir beauty of a tale."—Richard Lipez, The Washington Post
"A slim volume with the feel of a fable and the concision of a blues scale. Minor characters have marvelous names-Archibald Lawless, Dido Kazz, Mozelle Tot-and move with ageless grace. 'I felt a kinship to all of them,' Leonid thinks. So do we."—Tom Nolan, Wall Street Journal
"Good to have you back, Leonid."—John Timpane, Philadelphia Inquirer
"The charms of this short novel lie in Mosley's memorable characters, his portrayal of the world McGill inhabits and the author's uniquely lyrical writing style."—Bruce DeSilva, Associated Press
"A tight and quietly subversive tale about family, class, privilege, and race (plus honor, of all things) that packs a hard tight punch. You won't see it coming, but you'll know when it lands."—Kevin Burton Smith, Mystery Scene Magazine
"[Mosley] wanders through a few underworlds of the New York City crime category, always a treat for readers, and one that packs a moral punch. Mosley is, quite simply, an icon of detective fiction, and with each new novel in the McGill series he's making New York noir his own just as he did with Los Angeles."—LitHub
"Spieled in a powerful, streamlined voice, this wrenching American noir will stick with readers long after the final page."—Booklist
"Watching McGill coolly deploy the physical and intellectual skills he'd acquired in his previous life as an underworld "fixer" provides the principal pleasure of this installment, along with Mosley's own way of making prose sound like a tender, funny blues ballad...Mosley delivers enough good stuff to let you know a master's at work."—Kirkus
Library Journal - Audio
04/01/2020
Leonid McGill is a successful private investigator in NYC whose background in criminal activity and uncanny intelligence give him an edge on keeping one step ahead of the criminals and ne'er-do-wells he is hired to investigate. McGill's mission to deliver a letter that reveals Black lineage in the wealthy family of a soon-to-be-bride becomes treacherous, as assassins and thugs attempt to thwart McGill's every move. Throughout the story, Mosley paints a vivid picture of the geography, landmarks, and neighborhoods in which the story unfolds. The rich voice narrator Dion Graham provides authenticity to the setting and emotional context. Verdict Wherever Mosley's novels have been in demand, this will be a necessary purchase.—Ann Weber, Bellarmine Coll. Prep., San Jose, CA
FEBRUARY 2020 - AudioFile
Dion Graham offers an amazing performance of Edgar Award-winning Walter Mosley’s sixth P.I. Leonid McGill outing in the badass world of crime and criminals. His dubious past allows Leonid entrée into places where upstanding citizens wouldn’t go. “Catfish” Worry, a 94-year-old black blues musician, asks Leonid to deliver a letter to a seemingly white billionaire’s daughter before her wedding, letting her know that her father is his son. Leonid finds himself embroiled in a tangled web of secrets and deceit, gunmen and assassins. Graham delivers Mosley’s noir mystery with his usual excellence, giving each character an individual personality. His women are always respectfully treated, never stereotypes, while his gangsters are frighteningly real. With his mastery of dialects and tone, Graham delivers suspense best listened to. S.J.H. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award, 2021 Audies Finalist © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine