SOURCE: A review of A Little Yellow Dog, in Booklist, Vol. 92, No. 17, May 1, 1996, p. 1469.

In the following review, Ott contends that Mosley's placement of Easy Rawlins in true historical context is the primary reason for the success of the series.

Most successful mystery series find a good groove and stay put, holding their audience with the pleasures of familiarity. Only the best crime writers manage to rework their grooves, staying put but never letting comfort supersede substance. Then there's Walter Mosley, whose Easy Rawlins mysteries break most of the rules. By allowing Easy to grow older in real time (in five books, the series has moved from the mid-1940s through 1963), Mosley forces himself to reinvent his hero in every book, asking readers to accept change in a series character much as we would in ourselves, gradually but inevitably. In this installment [A Little Yellow Dog] Easy has...