Devil in a Blue Dress, set in 1948, introduces the detective hero Easy Rawlins, an ex-soldier and unemployed aircraft worker. To keep up payments on his house, he accepts an offer of money from a disreputable white man to locate a blond woman who frequents the African American clubs. Soon people start turning up dead. To cope, Easy gets help from his homicidal sidekick, Mouse. Easy comes by the stolen money with which he buys the properties that bring him his tax problems in A Red Death.

In White Butterfly (1992) Mosley retains chronological continuity, setting this novel three years after A Red Death. Easy has a marriage in the process of breaking up, while Watts is plagued with killings of "party girls" employed in local bars. Since one woman is white, the police become very interested, arresting Mouse for the crimes. Cigar-smoking Mofass still serves as Easy's...