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High Praise for The Unvarnished Gary Phillips “The Unvarnished Gary Phillips is a fabulous exploration of the career of a true trailblazer in the crime fiction universe. Gary paved the way for a lot of us writers of color with his fearless artistry and sharp dialogue and his endless wit and wisdom. A magnificent collection.” —S.A. Cosby, best-selling author, Razorblade Tears and Blacktop Wasteland “The Unvarnished Gary Phillips is a blast of a collection by the wizard of pulpy crime stories set in the past and far into the future. Phillips gives us smart-ass characters punching their way through kick-ass action scenes. An incredible read!” —Rachel Howzell Hall, New York Times and Wall Sreet Journal bestselling author  “Chaotic, funny, insightful and faster than a blast of speeding bullets. Into pulp fiction? Unvarnished is your Shangri La.” —Joe Ide, best-selling author, the IQ Series “Pulp is the jazz of literature, and Gary Phillips is it’s impresario—riffing and improvising on themes from mean streets to the phantasmagorical in seventeen compositions designed to flip your wig!” —Christopher Chambers, author, Scavenger, Standalone Past Praise for Gary Phillips For One-shot Harry  “For thirty years Phillips has been a must-read writer.” —Lee Child “Phillips is a storyteller first, and the social chronicling never becomes didactic or overtakes the narrative.” The New York Times Book Review For Matthew Henson and The Ice Temple of Harlem “A wildly entertaining extravaganza.”―Booklist (Starred) For The Obama Inheritance “Cheerfully strange and purposefully bizarre.” ―The Washington Post “So sly, fresh and Bizarro World witty, they reaffirm the resiliency of the artistic imagination.” ―Maureen Corrigan, NPR’s Fresh Air For Astonishing Heroes: Shades of Justice “Gary Phillips is the man. . . . Hand-to-hand combat action, demons and magic to boot, internal dialogue, buckets of high-caliber bullets, plus scantily clad women and the heroes they love. Add a Black Dynamite blaxploitative filter and you’re in.” —Ebony “A book for anyone who remains nostalgic for the golden age of Toei films, blaxploitation movies, and lusty grindhouse cinema.” —Superhero Novels

Past Praise for Gary PhillipsFor One-shot Harry Terrific . . . What makes One-Shot Harry a standout is the cityscape of mid-century L.A it summons up - its music, chromium cars, hateful slurs, invisible racial boundaries and cautious hopes. -NPR's Fresh Air Phillips is a storyteller first, and the social chronicling never becomes didactic or overtakes the narrative. The wounds of 1963, and the foreshadowing of both better days and harsher ones, feel unnervingly fresh, and a reminder that progress, much as we wish otherwise, never adheres to a linear timeline. The New York Times Book Review For Matthew Henson and The Ice Temple of Harlem Along with the rampaging retro action, Phillips smoothly incorporates biting social commentary on the racism of the era. Henson is a terrific character, larger-than-life in a movie-serial way, and the story's pacing is exquisite. The first installment in a projected series, this is a rousing adventure in the grand pulp tradition, a wildly entertaining extravaganza that almost demands to be filmed. Booklist (Starred) While the entertainment value is high in MATTHEW HENSON AND THE ICE TEMPLE OF HARLEM, Phillips shows the racism Henson encountered on a daily basis. With its echoes of the Doc Savage series and the Indiana Jones movies, MATTHEW HENSON AND THE ICE TEMPLE OF HARLEM should make for long-running series. The South Florida Sun-Sentinel For The Obama Inheritance, Winner of the 2018 Anthony Award and Bronze Medal Winner of the 2018 Foreword Indies Award for Best Anthology Resistance takes many forms, particularly in the current political climate. Few methods of protest are as cheerfully strange and purposefully bizarre as THE OBAMA INHERITANCE. The Washington Post It's a commonplace these days to say that real life has become so unpredictable that it outstrips anything anyone could dream up in fiction. I think I'm guilty of having made that banal observation a few times. But that was before I read The Obama Inheritance, a collection of 15 stories so sly, fresh and Bizarro World witty, they reaffirm the resiliency of the artistic imagination. Maureen Corrigan, NPR Fresh Air

High Praise for The Unvarnished Gary Phillips “The Unvarnished Gary Phillips is a fabulous exploration of the career of a true trailblazer in the crime fiction universe. Gary paved the way for a lot of us writers of color with his fearless artistry and sharp dialogue and his endless wit and wisdom. A magnificent collection.” —S.A. Cosby, best-selling author, Razorblade Tears and Blacktop Wasteland “The Unvarnished Gary Phillips is a blast of a collection by the wizard of pulpy crime stories set in the past and far into the future. Phillips gives us smart-ass characters punching their way through kick-ass action scenes. An incredible read!” —Rachel Howzell Hall, New York Times and Wall Sreet Journal bestselling author  “Chaotic, funny, insightful and faster than a blast of speeding bullets. Into pulp fiction? Unvarnished is your Shangri La.” —Joe Ide, best-selling author, the IQ Series “Few people know pulp like Gary Phillips, who is not only a student of the genre, but a master. The Unvarnished Gary Phillips shows him in top form and with the verve and grit that are essential to the best pulp and hardboiled tales. I had a blast reading these. You will, too.” —Alex Segura, best-selling award-winning author, Secret Identity “Pulp is the jazz of literature, and Gary Phillips is it’s impresario—riffing and improvising on themes from mean streets to the phantasmagorical in seventeen compositions designed to flip your wig!” —Christopher Chambers, author, Scavenger, Standalone Past Praise for Gary Phillips For One-shot Harry  “For thirty years Phillips has been a must-read writer.” —Lee Child “Phillips is a storyteller first, and the social chronicling never becomes didactic or overtakes the narrative.” The New York Times Book Review For Matthew Henson and The Ice Temple of Harlem “A wildly entertaining extravaganza.”―Booklist (Starred) For The Obama Inheritance “Cheerfully strange and purposefully bizarre.” ―The Washington Post “So sly, fresh and Bizarro World witty, they reaffirm the resiliency of the artistic imagination.” ―Maureen Corrigan, NPR’s Fresh Air For Astonishing Heroes: Shades of Justice “Gary Phillips is the man. . . . Hand-to-hand combat action, demons and magic to boot, internal dialogue, buckets of high-caliber bullets, plus scantily clad women and the heroes they love. Add a Black Dynamite blaxploitative filter and you’re in.” —Ebony “A book for anyone who remains nostalgic for the golden age of Toei films, blaxploitation movies, and lusty grindhouse cinema.” —Superhero Novels

Author Information

Gary Phillips has been a community activist, labor organizer and delivered dog cages. He's published various novels, comics, short stories and edited several anthologies including South Central Noir and the Anthony award-winning The Obama Inheritance: Fifteen Stories of Conspiracy Noir. Violent Spring, first published in 1994 was named in 2020 one of the essential crime novels of Los Angeles. He was also a writer/co-producer on FX's Snowfall (streaming on Hulu), about crack and the CIA in 1980s South Central where he grew up. Recent novels include One-Shot Harry and Matthew Henson and the Ice Temple of Harlem. He lives with his family in the wilds of Los Angeles.

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