Ash Dark as Night is a novel featuring photographer and PI Harry Ingram, written by Gary Phillips. Released 2nd April 2024 by Soho Press on their Soho Crime imprint, it's 241 pages and is available in hardcover, audio, and ebook formats. Paperback due out late 2nd quarter 2025 from the same publisher. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links throughout.

This is a very well written gritty PI mystery set in LA in 1965. Harry captures undeniable proof of routine police brutality against the backdrop of the LA race riots which puts a target on his, Harry's back. Trying to get the proof published in the papers is a daunting nail-biting effort, aided by Harry's gutsy and brave girlfriend.

The book's prose is redolent of the time period and the dialogue is smart and whip-sharp. The cynicism from the main characters is palpable (and expected, given the overt deadly casual racism and economic injustice of the time).

The mystery is well written and leads to a satisfying (if bitter) denouement and resolution. The author has woven his story around a framework of real life history so skillfully that it's not always clear where history shades into fiction. It's not at all derivative, but the style and story will suit fans of Walter Mosley, Robert Crais, and James Ellroy.

The unabridged audiobook has a run time of 8 hours 20 minutes and is capably read by Leon Nixon. He has a well modulated, warm, rumbly baritone and handles the rapid dialogue without fumbles. He delineates the varied characters of both sexes and a range of socioeconomic classes and ethnicities clearly and without confusing the listener.

Four stars. It should be on the acquisitions lists for most public libraries, and would make a good choice for fans of historical PI noir.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.

This was a tough read and rage-inducing, as it should be. Racism is disgusting. Gary Phillips does a great job of putting you into the scene and life of those in his story. I have added all of his books to my TBR.

#AshDarkasNight
#NetGalley

Thanks to NetGalley for the advance audiobook of this title. The audiobook was very well done, and the narrator handled a large and diverse cast of characters well, I love that the book started during the Watts riots and we get a picture of LA during that point in history. It was definitely an inflection point and both good and bad followed. Tom Bradley and Martin Luther King Jr make appearances in the book. The plot itself had many different threads and characters, not all of which are well-developed or come together in the end. I wish it had been more tightly plotted and that a fewer number of characters had been better fleshed out.

I was really enjoying Ash Dark as Night . . . until I really wasn't.

What I liked: Right out of the gate, I was engaged by the Black photographer/occasional amateur private eye main character. Using the historical setting of the Watts riots allowed the author to create a lot of action, suspense, and grit. The police brutality Harry Ingram captured on film during the riots was a great set-up. Ingram using his observational skills to solve a mystery is a plausible extension. I was even amused and relatively engaged by Ingram's girlfriend Anita's “family business.” Leon Nixon is an excellent narrator.

What I didn't like: Phillips' delivery of the history was sometimes awkward. While sex and seduction are often used in noir as plot advancers, I believe it's usually used as a means to the desired ends on the part of someone involved in the mystery. For example, a femme fatale uses sex to coerce someone into killing her husband. Here, explicit sex is described even among an established couple (on the same side of the mystery), and even in public spaces. It seemed gratuitous to me—I don't think it advanced the plot. As the book went on, the story fell apart, and I lost interest.

This is the second installment in a series of which I did not read the first book. I think the second works fine as a standalone read.

This unbiased review is based on an audio ARC supplied by the publisher—RB Media. It was published earlier this week—April 2.

This is the second book in the series set in Los Angeles in the 1960s. It features Harry Ingram, an Army veteran, freelance photographer and process server. I also read the first book, “One-Shot Harry”, but this book can be read as a standalone. In this book, Harry photographs an instance of police brutality during the Watts riot, putting him in the crosshairs of a police intelligence unit.

I like the historical details of this series. The beginning of the book, when Harry was photographing the riot, has a vivid, documentary feel to it. The later part of the book, when Harry is searching for a missing man, felt messy and I didn’t find it as compelling. No resolution is reached in the end. Maybe it will be in book 3. I referred the first book, but I will continue to read the series. As with the first book, the audiobook was narrated by Leon Nixon. He again did an excellent job.

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.

Ash Dark as Night by Gary Phillips and narrated by Leon Nixon is Book 2 of the "A Harry Ingram Mystery" series and the first audiobook I have listened to from this author and it is outstanding

Leon Nixon has a beautiful timbre that is at once strong and calm, undulating with thhe flow of the narrative in spectacular fashion

Gary Phillips is a master of atmospheric, authentic narrative and dialogue, interspersing historical fact in a powerful opening to the novel with an intriguing mystery to fill out the storyline

The story is based during the Watts Riots of 1965 which took place at a time of continuing civil and social unrest due to illegal Residential Segregation which continued even after the state courts ruled in 1948 and the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The trigger point came after a young African American motorist was stopped for a sobreity test and his mother was struck, inciting outrage and rioting in a systemically marginalised community

Harry Ingram is a Crime Photographer and for the purposes of the riot he is Press (as he identifies himself to the white police officers that challenge him) Harry Ingram captures multiple images of the riot, culminating in having just 4 plates left, when he sees a that of a young, unarmed protestor on top of a car who cries out; "No-one needs to be made dead over getting some bread" and as Harry shoots the picture, the police shoot their guns, fatally wounding the young protester. One of the police notices Harry moving away and that he has a camera, immediately reacting to the potential implications and sets about him, smashing his camera and taking the film out, exposing it to the sunlight, except, he removes the wrong film from the wrong camera

Harry is knocked unconscious and wakes up in a prison hospital, where his gf Anita Claire comes to visit him. She has a litany of secrets of her own, that she is terrified to share with Harry, but she braves going back into the fray of the riot to retrieve the photographic plate and get it to the press. The picture is then plastered across the media, and while it does not show the flash of the gun that shot the fatal bullet, it creates an outcry across LA from one side and denial from the other. However, there is more than one soul lost on this day and HArry is soon asked to seek out Mose Tolbert for his GF's mother, which turns up a lot more than he was expecting

An outstanding piece of fact/fiction crossover that smashes beyond the genre of crime thriller and into literature. HIghly compelling and utterly immersive. Brilliant

Thank you to Netgalley, RB Media | Recorded Books, the author Gary Phillips and narrator Leon Nixon for this awesome ALC