The Agatha and the Ecstasy

There’s been no official announcement yet regarding the 2007 Agatha Award winners. However, participants at this weekend’s Malice Domestic XIX convention, held in Arlington, Virginia, have finally leaked news regarding the victors.

Best First Novel: The Heat of the Moon, by Sandra Parshall (Poisoned Pen Press)

Also nominated: Consigned to Death, by Jane Cleland (St. Martin’s Minotaur); Feint of Art, by Hailey Lind (Signet); Murder on the Rocks, by Karen MacInerney (Midnight Ink); and The Chef Who Died Sautéing, by Honora Finklestein and Susan Smiley (Hilliard & Harris)

Best Novel: The Virgin of Small Plains, by Nancy Pickard (Random House)--which also happens to have been one of January Magazine’s favorite books of 2006

Also nominated: All Mortal Flesh, by Julia Spencer-Fleming (St. Martin’s Minotaur); Messenger of Truth, by Jacqueline Winspear (Holt); The Saddlemaker’s Wife, by Earlene Fowler (Penguin Group); and Why Casey Had to Die, by L.C. Hayden (Five Star)

Best Non-fiction: Don’t Murder Your Mystery, by Chris Roerden (Bella Rosa)

Also nominated: Mystery Muses: 100 Classics That Inspire Today’s Mystery Writers, by Jim Huang and Austin Lugar (Crum Creek Press); and The Beautiful Cigar Girl: Mary Rogers, Edgar Allan Poe and the Invention of Murder, by Daniel Stashower (Dutton), by Daniel Stashower (Penguin Group)

Best Short Story: “Sleeping with the Plush,” by Toni L.P. Kelner (Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, May 2006)

Also nominated: “Disturbance in the Field,” by Roberta Isleib (from Seasmoke: Crime Stories by New England Writers, edited by Kate Flora, Ruth McCarty, and Susan Oleksiw; Level Best Books); “Provenence,” by Robert Barnard (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine [EQMM], March/April 2006); “The Old Couple,” by Robert Barnard (EQMM, July 2006); and “Yankee Swap,” by Maurissa Guibord (EQMM, March/April 2006)

Best Young Adult: Pea Soup Poisonings, by Nancy Means Wright (Hilliard & Harris)

Also nominated: Behind the Curtain, by Peter Abrahams (HarperCollins); Room One: A Mystery or Two, by Andrew Clements (Simon & Schuster); and Sherlock Holmes and the Baker Street Irregulars: The Fall of the Amazing Zalindas, by Tracy Mack and Michael Citrin (Scholastic)

In addition to all of these, it should be mentioned that Meredith Cole has won the 2007 St. Martin’s Press/Malice Domestic Competition. Read more about that competition here.

While these commendations and other activities provided plenty of grist for conversations at Malice Domestic XIX, I understand there were also rumors racing about a major shakeup at Avon Books (an imprint of HarperCollins). The story is that Avon’s mystery editors have been dismissed, and authors with paperback deals at Avon have been “let loose.” As one source tells it, “The people who have hardcover deals with [HarperCollins] are OK, it’s just that many of them have paperbacks coming out with Avon and now will have to find another home for the paperbacks.” If anyone has more info about this, drop us a line or leave it in the Comments section below.

READ MORE: “It’s No Mystery Why Fans Flock to ‘Malice Domestic’ Convention,” by Stephen Seitz (Rutland Herald).