Cold Hard Cash: A Martha Chainey Escapade
Written by Gary Phillips with Art by Adriana Melo
Debuts Digitally Today, February 20, 2024
Comixology Originals presents the first-ever comics appearance of Martha Chainey, spinning out of the pages of crime novelist Gary Phillips’ acclaimed prose novels High Hand and Shooter’s Point. Featuring art by Adriana Melo, colors by John Kalisz, letters by Tom Napolitano, and edits by Greg Lockard, Cold Hard Cash: A Martha Chainey Escapade is a 5-part series starring Martha Chainey, a former showgirl-turned-mob-courier who heads from Las Vegas to Los Angeles. In the all-new story, Chainey assembles a new crew to solve a high-tech crime. The debut issue drops on February 20, 2024, from Amazon’s Comixology Originals exclusive digital content line.
“I’m thrilled to bring my tough as nails protagonist Martha Chainey to the pages of a comic,” says writer Phillips. “Seeing her navigate the gritty streets of LA and the high-end tech world in this fast-paced crime thriller illustrated by Adriana is surreal and I hope people dig it.”
Martha is a six-foot woman of color adept at martial arts. With no intention of winding up arm candy for some whale when she quit wearing forty-pound headdresses, she makes a living as a courier of off-the-books money—cold, hard cash. When her old friend, Rena Solomon, also an ex-Vegas showgirl, asks her in on a hush-hush job to find ten million dollars in stolen funds, Martha takes the gig.
Rena heads the Urban Collaborative, a nonprofit organization working to better conditions in South Central, which has recently partnered with Zentech, a Silicon Beach firm. Unfortunately, the Collaborative is computer hacked, and ten million dollars granted to the nonprofit for a cutting-edge center aimed at tech training and job placement goes missing.
As Martha delves into the theft, the evidence indicates the funds were converted to cash. The trail leads her throughout California from the seedy Salton Sea’s Slab city to the tony Zentech campus. Through the investigation’s twists and turns she encounters ski-masked hacktivists and the alt-right Reclaimers also on the hunt for the swag—as she seeks to uncover the truth.
Will Martha’s head slammin’ sleuth skills be enough to recover the missing cash?
About the Creators:
Gary Phillips has written comics for the likes of DC Comics (Angeltown and Vigilante: Southland) and Boom! Studios (High Rollers and The Rinse) and edited several anthologies including the Anthony award-winning The Obama Inheritance: Fifteen Stories of Conspiracy Noir. The Washington Post named his novel One-Shot Harry as one of the best mysteries of 2022. Phillips was a staff writer and co-producer on FX’s Snowfall, streaming on Hulu about crack and the CIA in 1980s South Central. He also co-conceived and co-edited the linked anthology Culprits: The Heist Was Just the Beginning which served as the source material for the miniseries Culprits, also streaming on Hulu. For more head over to: https://gdphillips.com/
Adriana Melo is a comic book artist, who has worked for DC Comics, Marvel, Dark Horse and Image Comics. Some of the books she worked on as a penciler include: Fantastic Four, Silver Surfer, Star Wars: Empire, Rose & Thorn, Witchblade, Miss Marvel, Birds of Prey, Catwoman. She recently had a 15-issue run on the monthly series New Adventures of the Ninth Doctor. Other miniseries her work has appeared in include Harley & Ivy meets Betty & Veronica, Plastic Man, Female Furies and Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy and she was the cover artist for the Comixology Originals series Beatrix Rose: Vigilante.
Brian Isaacs - Executive Editor / Publisher