The Tempest Tales
Walter Mosley, 2008
Simon & Schuster
192 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781416599494
Summary
Mistaken for another man, wily Tempest is "accidentally" shot by police. Sent to receive the judgment of heaven he discovers that his sins, according to St. Peter, condemn him to hell. Tempest takes exception to the saint's definition of sin; he refuses to go to hell and explains that he, a poor Black man living in Harlem, did what he did for family, friends, and love.
St. Peter, whose judgment has never been challenged, understands the secret of damnation and heaven's celestial authority—mortals must willingly accept their sins.
Should Tempest continue his refusal, heaven will collapse, thereby allowing hell and its keeper, the fallen angel Satan, to reign supreme. The only solution: send this recalcitrant mortal back to earth with an accounting angel, whose all-important mission is to persuade Tempest to accept his sins and St. Peter's judgment.
In this episodic battle with heaven and hell for his ultimate destiny, Tempest also takes the reader on a philosophic and humorous journey where free will is pitted against class and race—and the music of heaven is pitted against the blues. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—January 12, 1952
• Where—Los Angeles, California, USA
• Education—B.A., Johnson State College
• Awards—Mystery Writers Grand Master; Shamus Award, Private Eye Writers of America; Grammy Award for Best Album Notes
• Currently—lives in New York City
When President Bill Clinton announced that Walter Mosley was one of his favorite writers, Black Betty (1994), Mosley's third detective novel featuring African American P.I. Easy Rawlins, soared up the bestseller lists. It's little wonder Clinton is a fan: Mosley's writing, an edgy, atmospheric blend of literary and pulp fiction, is like nobody else's. Some of his books are detective fiction, some are sci-fi, and all defy easy categorization.
Mosley was born in Los Angeles, traveled east to college, and found his way into writing fiction by way of working as a computer programmer, caterer, and potter. His first "Easy Rawlins" book, Gone Fishin' didn't find a publisher, but the next, Devil in a Blue Dress (1990) most certainly did—and the world was introduced to a startlingly different P.I.
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Part of the success of the Easy Rawlins series is Mosley's gift for character development. Easy, who stumbles into detective work after being laid off by the aircraft industry, ages in real time in the novels, marries, and experiences believable financial troubles and successes. In addition, Mosley's ability to evoke atmosphere—the dangers and complexities of life in the toughest neighborhoods of Los Angeles—truly shines. His treatment of historic detail (the Rawlins books take place in Los Angeles from the 1940s to the mid-1960s) is impeccable, his dialogue fine-tuned and dead-on.
In 2002, Mosley introduced a new series featuring Fearless Jones, an Army vet with a rigid moral compass, and his friend, a used-bookstore owner named Paris Minton. The series is set in the black neighborhoods of 1950s L.A. and captures the racial climate of the times. Mosley himself summed up the first book, 2002's Fearless Jones, as "comic noir with a fringe of social realism."
Despite the success of his bestselling crime series, Mosley is a writer who resolutely resists pigeonholing. He regularly pens literary fiction, short stories, essays, and sci-fi novels, and he has made bold forays into erotica, YA fiction, and political polemic. "I didn't start off being a mystery writer," he said in an interview with NPR. "There's many things that I am." Fans of this talented, genre-bending author could not agree more!
Extras
From a 2004 Barnes & Noble interview:
• Mosley is an avid potter in his spare time.
• He was a computer programmer for 15 years before publishing his first book. He is an avid collector of comic books. And ahe believes that war is rarely the answer, especially not for its innocent victims.
• When asked what book most influenced his career as a writer, here is what he said:
The Stranger by Albert Camus probably had the greatest impact on me. I suppose that's because it was a novel about ideas in a very concrete and sensual world. This to me is the most difficult stretch for a writer—to talk about the mind and spirit while using the most pedestrian props. Also the hero is not an attractive personality. He's just a guy, a little removed, who comes to heroism without anyone really knowing it. This makes him more like an average Joe rather than someone beyond our reach or range.
(Bio and interview from Barnes & Noble .)
Book Reviews
Mosley, best known for his gritty Easy Rawlins mysteries, explores cosmic questions of justice and redemption in this odd tale of Tempest Landry, a black man shot dead by police when they thought he was pulling a gun. Landry throws the afterlife into turmoil by refusing to accept St. Peter's judgment that he must spend eternity in Hell. Three years after his death, Landry is returned to Manhattan, with a new face and an angel named Joshua to watch over him. As Landry sets up one morally complex situation after another, Joshua engages him in discussions of situational ethics, trying to get Landry to accept that he is a sinner and deserves damnation. Eventually, Landry recruits Satan himself in his cause. The interesting concept is not matched by its execution, but some readers may find Landry a humorous creation and appreciate his eventual solution to his dilemma.
Publishers Weekly
Tempest Landry, a quick-witted African American resident of Harlem, NY, is walking home when a case of mistaken identity leads to his being shot by police. He finds himself standing in line at the gates of heaven waiting to talk to Saint Peter, who reviews his past transgressions and finds him wanting. Tempest is denied entry into heaven and ordered to hell. Believing his "sins" justified and heaven refusing to see the full truth, Tempest refuses to go and challenges Saint Peter to prove to him that he is a sinner. And so begins Tempest's return to Earth with a denizen of heaven, Joshua Angel, to convince Tempest of Saint Peter's edict. Of course, the devil wants Tempest's soul and is scheming to use Tempest to destroy heaven. In a salute to Langston Hughes's Jesse B. Semple stories, Mosley, best-known for his Easy Rawlins mystery series, has written a humorous, thought-provoking, and accessible literary tale of the concept and treatment of sin and sinners in contemporary times. Recommended for popular fiction and African American fiction collections.
Joy St. John - Library Journal
Tempest Landry, a black man gunned down by white cops in Harlem, finds himself judged by St. Peter at heaven’s gate—and disputes the result.... Though the novel sometimes feels thrown together, Mosley is enough of a pro to make this talky allegory fun and even funny—it picks up steam with the arrival of a devilish white man named Basel Bob—but less message-specific fiction might have been more interesting, and pure nonfiction might have been meatier. Mosley is a big name, but his ever-increasing output means that even loyal fans must choose their favorite genres in his ever-growing oeuvre. —Keir Graff
Booklist
Versatile Mosley tells the story of a black man dead before his time who shakes up the divine order by refusing his condemnation to Hell. Tempest Landry is walking up Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard in Harlem, minding his own business, when a police officer takes him for an armed robber he's pursuing and shoots him dead. According to St. Peter, Tempest deserves eternal damnation not because of the robbery-the heavenly recorder doesn't make such errors-but because he stabbed a schoolboy who was about to shoot him, stole church funds to buy his sick aunt groceries and told lies that sent an incorrigible rapist and killer to prison for a crime he didn't commit. When Tempest respectfully dissents, Peter sees no alternative to sending him back to earth, accompanied by a heavenly accountant who takes the name Joshua Angel, until he accepts the divine judgment. Back in Harlem, however, Tempest is no more pliable than he was at the gates of Heaven. In a series of brief chapters, he keeps remonstrating with Angel that although he may not be perfect, he hasn't done anything all that bad either. Each chapter is launched by a new narrative premise: Tempest finds that his wife has taken up with another man; Tempest attends the funeral of an ancient family friend; Angel finds himself falling for a woman Tempest has introduced him to; the Devil, in the form of someone named Bob, appears and demands Tempest's soul. But the core of the tale is the anti-catechism that emerges from the dialogues between man and angel. For all the audacity of his imagination, Mosley (Blonde Faith, 2007, etc.) is no theologian. He seems unaware of either the centuries of catechetical literature or the dozens of deal-with-the-devil stories that precede his own entry. A classic case of overreaching, though one that's often moving and provoking.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
Use our LitLovers Book Club Resources; they can help with discussions for any book:
• How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips)
• Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction
• Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart)
Also consider these LitLovers talking points to help get a discussion started for The Tempest Tales:
1. Does Tempest deserve to be delivered to hell? Is St. Peter correct—is Tempest a sinner?
2. Mosley's book is about casuistry, or situational ethics—when is a sin not really a sin? Are there extenuating circumstances that erase, or mitigate, a sin? In each of the "tales" of this novel, Tempest faces temptation—what do you think of his decisions / actions? What other types of situations can you think of, in our own lives, that involve making decisions that are, on the surface, wrong but perhaps end up doing good...or doing less harm than otherwise?
3. What do you make of the two supernatural powers—Joshua Angel and Basel John?
4. Does The Tempest Tales challenge your understanding of sin and judgment according to Christian doctrine?
5. Are you satisfied with the ultimate ending of this book? Do characters get what they truly deserve—or not?
(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)
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