Ep1: Chris Chambers Noir — Get ready for a little noir magic! Don’t miss our Q&A with the mastermind behind Washington, DC’s most notorious fictional detective — former street denizen Dickie Cornish, who faces off with bloodthirsty cops and the justice department

July 2025 — Ready for a little Street Whys grit to get you going today? In Ep1 of bestselling noir author Chris Chambers’ new show, Chris Chambers Noir, you’ll learn what motivated this Washington, D.C. native to write more than 16 books, and counting!

In today’s interview with Hope Katz Gibbs, producer of InkandescentRadio.com, she asks Chris:

• Tell us about your day job and the work you are doing as the chair of the International Conflict Resolution Center, and General Counsel to a not-for-profit benefiting HBCUs
• What inspired you to start writing?
• Your first book, Sympathy for the Devil, was published on Sept. 11, 2001 — a crazy day to publish a thriller! It’s part of your first series featuring FBI Special Agent Angela Bivens. Tell us about those books.
• You’ve written a bunch of books for Marvel including Captain America: The Shield of Sam Wilson and Black Panther: Tales of Wakanda. How did you land that gig, and what is it like to write for the mega-hit comic book publisher?
• What are you working on now?
• We met at your book event at Elaine’s Literay Salon in April 2025 and in the audience was your beautiful and equally successful wife. Tell us about her and your family here in DC.
• This is Ep1 of your new show on InkandescentRadio.com with the video version appearing on our YouTube channel, Chris Chambers TV. Share with our audience what you have planned for the show, and who we’ll be meeting in Ep2!

About Chris: A Washington, D.C. native, Chris is a lecturer at Georgetown University, Chair of the International Conflict Resolution Center and is General Counsel to a not-for-profit benefitting HBCUs: Student Housing of America. He is the author of the Angela Bivens thriller series for Random House, The Rocket Crockett pulp noir series, and Black Pulp for Prose-Press, and editor, along with Gary Phillips, of The Darker Mask graphic short story collection, the Bronze Buckaroo Rides Again: Honoring Harlem’s Herb Jeffries. He was a finalist in 2008 for the PEN/Malamud Short Story Award for “Leviathan.”

He’s contributed short stories to The Obama Inheritance: 15 Stories of Conspiracy Noir (Three Rooms Press) and is the winner of the Anthony Award. The Black Panther: Tales Of Wakanda, The Faking of the President, and Midnight Hour, Witnesses for the Dead with Gar Anthony Haywood–all major award-winning collections and bestsellers. His noir hardboiled mystery Scavenger (2020) won a starred review and profile in Publishers Weekly; the sequel Standalone sees the return of the indestructible homeless addict turned PI Dickie Cornish, patrolling the unforgiving city streets ravaged by COVID, with the third in the trilogy Streetwhys in 2025. His next Marvel contribution is in Captain America: The Shield of Sam Wilson.

About Chris’s latest book, “Street Whys:” We again meet Washington, DC’s notorious detective, former street denizen Dickie Cornish, who faces off with bloodthirsty cops and the justice department. Underground detective Dickie Cornish faces a vindictive murder rap from his past if he doesn’t agree to help prove that the fentanyl ravaging the streets of DC is bankrolled by shadowy donors of a certain former president. Broke and desperate, Cornish soon finds himself on a collision course with shady public defenders and corrupt police officers, forcing him to use his street connections to flip their plan. Or die.

The Dickie Cornish series has met with widespread critical acclaim: Publishers Weekly dubbed the series debut, Scavenger, “[A] no-holds-barred crime novel…a 21st-century twist on traditional hardboiled noir.” The Strand Magazine selected Standalone, the second book in the series, as one of the “Top 25 Mystery Novels of the Year,” adding, “It’s apparent that the modern heir to Chandler, Woolrich, and Cain is Christopher Chambers, enough said.” And renowned crime author George Pelecanos raves that the series “really nails Washington, DC in the current environment.” Click here to buy the book.

Click here to listen to Chris’s podcast interview with bestselling thriller novelist Jeffrey James Higgins at Elaine’s Literary Salon. Jeff says: “Streetwhys is more noir than any noir has any right to be. It’s the reason why book lovers call Chris’ stories dizzying. Raw. His words pop off the page like hot rounds from a Saturday Night Special. Buckle up, buttercup.”