Walter Mosley was born in South Central Los Angeles, in 1952, the son of a Jewish mother and a black father.

Although interracial relationships and mixed parentage figure prominently in some of the mysteries Mosley authored, in his private life bi-racial parentage is not an issue.

His suspense novels "Devil in a Blue Dress" (1990); "Red Death" (1991); "White Butterfly" (1992); "Black Betty" (1994) and "Little Yellow Dog" (1996) are unique in American crime fiction in a number of respects. First, they unfold in real historical time in the period between the end of World War II and the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Second, his novels reveal aspects of black life and culture in Los Angeles that most whites have never been exposed to.

The real uniqueness of his novels, thoughÐand most lasting literary value reside in the character Easy Rollins. Like the narrator in Ralph Ellison's "Invisible Man," Easy lives by a complex moral code in a dangerous predatory world, one in which he must constantly face up to the capacity for violence in himself and others.

In American literary history, only three other crime writers have received similar critical acclaim; Edgar Allen Poe, inventor of the detective story, Dashiell Hammett, and Raymond Chandler.