Phillips, whose latest novel, ‘One-Shot Harry,’ concerns a Black news photographer in Los Angeles, edited the upcoming anthology, ‘South Central Noir.

By Naomi Hirahara
FROM: OC Register

Veteran Los Angeles writer Gary Phillips signed “Violent Spring,” one of his early mysteries featuring his Black private investigator, Ivan Monk, with one of his trademark lines, “Writing is fighting.” That was back in 1995, when I was an aspiring novelist and editor of The Rafu Shimpo newspaper, seeking some words of wisdom from a more experienced professional.

Since that time, Gary and I have become colleagues in the mystery writing field. He’s asked me to contribute short stories to some of his numerous anthologies, including the upcoming “South Central Noir” (Akashic, September 2022). I used to collect all the books that he wrote or edited, but as that number has grown to more than 50, I’ve abandoned that endeavor.

I knew some things prior to this interview. I was well aware that he was a native of Los Angeles, a comic book nerd, and former high school football player. And that his mother had been a librarian and his wife, Gilda Haas, a well-known community organizer and economic justice advocate who has taught at UCLA.

A lot of Gary’s Los Angeles touchstones have either disappeared or morphed: the hospital where he was born, Queen of Angels, in Echo Park has closed; the original location of his mother’s library, the Ascot branch (256 W. 70th Street), is now offices for the Legal Aid Foundation; and his high school, Los Angeles Lutheran High, where both James and Janice Hahn attended, is no longer in South Central.

Gary has always striven to keep Los Angeles’ history in the forefront of readers’ minds and his most recent mystery novel, “One-Shot Harry,” which features a Black news photographer in the 1960s, perhaps most encapsulates his passion for the past. Read Rest of Interview Here