One-Shot Harry

in modified jockey gear straddling a hobby horse.
     Put on the radio, would you, Harry? Edwards said, yawning and stretching. Can t have Redd making me too excited before I go to bed alone.
     Pettigrew wiggled his fingers. Alone, you say?
     Everyone chuckled.
     Ingram slotted the Foxx album alphabetically among other comedic, jazz and blues albums he kept in wooden produce crates stacked in a corner. He turned the radio on, adjusting the antenna and turning the dial to bring the station in clearer.
     . . . and the hunt goes on for the bank robber dubbed the Morning Bandit. But now, my dear listeners, the DJ continued, we here at KGFJ urge all right-thinking Angelenos to come out and hear what Martin Luther King has to say when he arrives in town less than three weeks from today. As many of us know, his message isn t just for the South, but for what goes on here in the supposedly enlightened north.
     You covered the reverend when he was in town before, didn t you? Nakano said to Ingram as he sat down again. King had last been in Los Angeles two years earlier to speak at the Sports Arena. The facility had been filled to capacity with thousands standing outside to hear him over the loudspeakers.
     Yeah, I ve got a request in through the Sentinel to take shots when he speaks this time too. But they d already got this reporter assigned who takes his own pics. Ingram made part of his living as a photographer for the Black press.
     &ldqu

analysis of American greed, corruption, and racism . . . Encyclopedic knowledge of the history of Los Angeles s economic development and progressive politics deepens the plot of One-Shot Harry.
Paula Woods, Alta Magazine

The Phillips style of plotting fits squarely in the Chandler/Hammett tradition with the addition of intriguing and powerful issues of race.
Toronto Star

Race and racial tension are the backbone of this novel of the early 1960s . . . Phillips captures the volatility of those times, when civil rights was literally on the march. He also effectively conjures the seamier side of Los Angeles . . . Phillips nails the atmosphere. He also keeps the reader guessing.
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

For thirty years Phillips has been a must-read writer, and One-Shot Harry is probably his best ever tense and suspenseful, of course, but also deep, resonant and intelligent. It's a story that needed to be told, and therefore a book that needs to be read.
Lee Child

Few books are able to capture the essence and vibe of classic hardboiled fiction and still manage to make the prose feel modern and of-the-moment. Gary Phillips does just that with One-Shot Harry and the memorable titular protagonist, Harry Ingram. This book is a swift uppercut of gritty storytelling that will keep you hungrily turning the pages, loaded with moments that will linger in your mind long after you've finished reading.
Alex Segura, author of Secret Identity, Blackout, and Miami Midnight

Phillips vision of Los Angeles in 1963 comes to vivid life in the form of Harry Ingram, a news photographer and part-time process server who s putting himself in the firing line all day long as the city s racial and social divides pull further and further apart. When an old Army friend of his is killed in a car accident, Ingram takes his crime scene photos and his wits on a journey through a deeply corrupt city, looking for the final answers for one man s death.
CrimeReads

Los Angeles is as much a character as any of them, and part of the joy of reading One-Shot Harry is immersing oneself in Phillips grittily detailed rendering of the city, informed by his past experiences as a community activist in South LA . . . The shadows of Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett are discernible throughout Phillips lively narrative.
Pasadena Weekly

With its setting, this novel might remind you of Easy Rawlins or Harry Bosch, but I would strongly recommend reading it as a counterpoint to the LA Quartet by James Ellroy. Gary Phillips authentically tells the other side those who faced police and institutional racism in Los Angeles. And while, yes, it s about race, the author succeeds in directing us well beyond that theme and towards something much bigger. It s about justice.
Crime Fiction Lover

Phillips vividly captures the sights and sounds of the era (jazz and blues on Central Avenue) as well as the ubiquitous racism and police brutality that threatened everyone in the Black community. Ingram emerges as a particularly satisfying, no-nonsense hero.
Booklist, Starred Review

Terrific . . . With close attention to period detail and precise prose, Phillips brings the era vividly to life. Crime fiction fans won t want to miss this one.
Publishers Weekly, Starred Review

Phillips roots his hero s adventures in a densely woven web of real-life local history that emphasizes both Black Angelenos historic oppression and the moment for resistance crystallized in the Freedom Rally King plans en route to the demonstration in D.C. whose approach signals the possibility of historic change for both haves and have-nots. Like Walter Mosley in his stories about Easy Rawlins, Phillips presents a powerfully history-driven mystery.
Kirkus, Starred Review

Praise for Gary Phillips

Gary Phillips is my kind of crime writer.
Sara Paretsky, New York Times bestselling author
 
In the tradition of Dashiell Hammett . . . Makes us feel that the war he s waging is for our own salvation.
Walter Mosley, author of the Easy Rawlins series
 
Gary Phillips writes tough and gritty parables about life and death on the mean streets . . . his is a voice that should be heard and celebrated.
Michael Connelly, author of Void Moon and Angel s Flight