An atmospheric dive into a city on the brink that’s brimming with remarkable historical detail, ASH DARK AS NIGHT is perfect for fans of Walter Mosley and James Ellroy.

Los Angeles, August 1965. Anger and pent-up frustrations boil over in the Watts neighborhood after a traffic stop of two Black motorists. As the Watts riots explode, crime photographer Harry Ingram snaps photos at the scene, including images of the police as they unleash batons, dogs, and water hoses on civilians. When he captures the image of an unarmed activist being shot down by the cops, he winds up in the hospital, beaten, his camera missing. Proof of the unjust killing seems lost—until Ingram’s girlfriend, Anita Claire, retrieves the hidden film in a daring rescue. The photo makes front-page news.

A recuperating Ingram is approached by Betty Payton, a comrade of Anita’s mother, who wants Ingram’s help tracking down her business associate Moses “Mose” Tolbert, last seen during the riots. Ingram follows the investigation down a rabbit hole of burglary rings, bank robberies, looted cash, and clandestine agendas—all the while grappling with his newfound fame, which puts him in the sightlines of LAPD’s secretive intelligence division.

Ash Dark as Night is a nail-biting ride-along through mid-century Los Angeles with a crime fiction legend in the driver’s seat.

Gary Phillips has published novels, comics, novellas, short stories and edited or co-edited several anthologies, including the Anthony-winning THE OBAMA INHERITANCE: FIFTEEN STORIES OF CONSPIRACY NOIR. Almost thirty years after its publication, his debut, VIOLENT SPRING, was named one of the essential crime novels of Los Angeles. He was also a writer and co-producer on SNOWFALL, a show streaming on Hulu about crack and the CIA in 1980s South Central, where he grew up.

Christopher Chambers is a Washington, D.C. native lecturer at Georgetown University, attorney, and affordable student housing developer. He’s currently on the Bouchercon Mystery Conference Board. His first hardcover crime novels by Random House were SYMPATHY FOR THE DEVIL and A PRAYER FOR DELIVERANCE; his short story “Leviathan” was a finalist for PEN/Malamud Award. He is the author of pulp works ROCKET CROCKETT and the SHANGHAI SHE DEVIL, BLACK PULP I & II, THE BRONZE BUCKAROO RIDES AGAIN. He co-edited or co-scripted graphic works like THE DARKER MASK with Gary Phillips, THE POSSUM, AUTOBAHN TALES and THE GREEN HORNET. He’s contributed to Marvel’s THE BLACK PANTHER: TALES OF WAKANDA, and the upcoming SAM WILSON: CAPTAIN AMERICA. His crime short fiction has appeared in the Anthony Award winning THE OBAMA INHERITANCE, THE FAKING OF THE PRESIDENT, MIDNIGHT HOUR, and again with Gary Phillips in WITNESSES FOR THE DEAD from Soho Press. The noir hardboiled novels in his D.C. trilogy, SCAVENGER AND STANDALONE, were feted by Publishers Weekly. The third, STREETWHYS, arrives in late 2024.