Down the River unto the Sea

By: Walter Mosley

Narrated by: Dion Graham

Winner of the Edgar Award for Best Novel of the Year: bestselling author Walter Mosley "is back with a whole new character to love...As gorgeous a novel as anything he's ever written" (Washington Post).

Joe King Oliver was one of the NYPD's finest investigators until he was framed for sexual assault by unknown enemies within the force. A decade has passed since his release from Rikers, and he now runs a private detective agency with the help of his teenage daughter. Physically and emotionally broken by the brutality he suffered while behind bars, King leads a solitary life, his work and his daughter the only lights. When he receives a letter from his accuser confessing that she was paid to frame him years ago, King decides to find out who wanted him gone and why.

On a quest for the justice he was denied, King agrees to help a radical black journalist accused of killing two on-duty police officers. Their cases intertwine across the years and expose a pattern of corruption and brutality wielded against the black men, women, and children whose lives the law destroyed. All the while, two lives hang in the balance: King's client's and his own.

"A wild ride that delivers hard-boiled satisfaction while toying with our prejudices and preconceptions."—Steph Cha, Los Angeles Times

©2018 Walter Mosley (P)2018 Hachette Audio

Critic reviews

"Walter Mosley is back with a whole new character to love. . . . As gorgeous a novel as anything he's ever written. And with Joe King Oliver I'm betting, and hoping, he's given us a character we haven't see the last of."—Richard Lipez, Washington Post

"Gritty . . . The plot soars . . . Few mystery writers can examine issues of race—how it divides and binds people—as clearly and unflinchingly as Walter Mosley."—Oline Cogdill, Associated Press

"Great stuff . . . The vibrant characters and pulsating dialogue are primo Mosley."—Marilyn Stasio, New York Times Book Review

Not Moseley’s best

I enjoyed the usual techniques used my Mr. Moseley. But this felt like a cookie cutter story and did not have the uniqueness of his earlier works. And I have read them all. But, the reading was excellent. Hats off to Dion Graham

Lessons Learned

Walter Mosley is in New York solving 2 crimes and I was engrossed from beginning to end. We got to see the life of police officer King and his family. I totally enjoyed the narration of this title it was so passionate that we as listeners could really get into the story and feel what each character was going through.

Loved it! Hard to stop listening,

Narrator was the best! I highly recommend this book for reading or listening. Will definitely get another by this author.

definitely noir

This was my first Walter Mosley, and it was good. Good start (although a bit hard to follow all the twists and turns), very good narration.

Mystery Master Applies His Formula

I’ll put myself in the front rank of Walter Mosley fans. I’ve taught Devil in a Blue Dress so many times that the spine is cracked and the margins are full. I’ve read almost all of the Easy Rawlins novels, many of them multiple times. And I’ve done scholarship on him, presenting at a conference and working up a couple drafts of an essay on him.

Mosley started out his career as brilliant as he has ever been. Devil in a Blue Dress has its clumsy narrative moments, but it’s an extraordinary reimagining of the detective novel as a lens to examine not just race – which it justly receives a lot of attention for having done – but also masculinity.

The more Mosley wrote, the more skilled he became, working through a lot of the clumsiness and – through the Mosley novels – exploring the changed nature of race in America. (I still love the title of the essay I have never quite finished: “A Line of Any Color is Still a Colored Line.) Racism didn’t end with the 1960s, of course not, but its manifestations changed, and Mosley was right there, tracing them through Easy’s adventures. The brilliance of the original insight got more and more attenuated, but he generally kept the novels fresh and compelling.

Here, as we move outside the Easy novels, Mosley is on top of his craft, but it feels as if he’s imitating himself. Joe King Oliver has a fair bit of Easy in him; he’s a decent man who, having been framed as a cop, tries to keep his head down from the “villainous” powers that be. Even more like Easy, he has a sociopathic friend – not Mouse here but rather Mel – who trades in the amoral violence he can’t quite stomach himself.

There are a couple mysteries in tandem – a convicted cop-killer who’s really more an African-American activist and then the reemergence of the case of his own framing – but that’s part of the formula.

Mosley is too good for this to be entirely disposable, and I like the glimpse of his method when he has to start from scratch after the many Easy and later Socrates Fortlaw novels, but this is too familiar to be all that memorable.

There’s nothing especially difficult here, but it isn’t Easy either.

I pray that this is the beginning of a series...

great setup and back stories of key characters. although Walter is a southern man, he does a good job of capturing northern attitudes.

Great writer great book

Walter Mosley never disappoints. He is a very good writer. This book is excellent with well developed characters and a great plot. Dion Graham does a great job narrating.

Not as good as usual

Let me up first day that I love Walter Mosley‘s writing. Easy Rawlins, especially Devil in a blue dress are classic noir mysteries. However this book falls far short of Mosley’s usual Mark. The story was predictable and the characters were flat. The only thing that kept me going through this book is what is Dion Graham’s wonderful narration. one of the characters seemed directly lifted from Devil in a blue dress.

great read!!!

Another slam dunk for Mosley. I enjoy your all his books, he maintains his ability to write a story with vivid descriptions and complex situations.

New mystery by this author

Overall I liked the book. It took me awhile to remember characters and who was doing what but it kept me entertaining. I am a fan of Easy Rawlins so this book is different from that in setting, family etc.