Macavity Inspection

Mystery Readers International has announced its nominees for the 2007 Macavity Awards. Members of that organization both nominate contenders and select the winners. In the running this year:

Best Mystery Novel:
• Christine Falls, by Benjamin Black (Picador)
• The Janissary Tree, by Jason Goodwin (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
• The Dead Hour, by Denise Mina (Bantam)
• The Virgin of Small Plains, by Nancy Pickard (Ballantine)
• Piece of My Heart, by Peter Robinson (McClelland & Stewart)
• All Mortal Flesh, by Julia Spencer-Fleming (St. Martin’s Minotaur)

Best First Novel:
• Consigned to Death, by Jane K. Cleland (St. Martin’s Minotaur)
• 47 Rules of Highly Effective Bank Robbers, by Troy Cook (Capital Crime Press)
• The King of Lies, by John Hart (St. Martin’s Minotaur)
• A Field of Darkness, by Cornelia Read (Mysterious Press)
• Mr. Clarinet, by Nick Stone (Michael Joseph Ltd./Penguin)

Best Non-fiction:
• Mystery Muses: 100 Classics That Inspire Today’s Mystery Writers, edited by Jim Huang and Austin Lugar (Crum Creek)
• The Beautiful Cigar Girl: Mary Rogers, Edgar Allan Poe, and the Invention of Murder, by Daniel Stashower (Dutton)
• Don’t Murder Your Mystery: 24 Fiction Writing Techniques to Save Your Manuscript from Ending Up D.O.A., by Chris Roerden (Bella Rosa Books)

Best Short Story:
• “Provenance,” by Robert Barnard (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, July 2006)
• “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)
• “Till Death Do Us Part,” by Tim Maleeny (from Death Do Us Part: New Stories about Love, Lust, and Murder, edited by Harlan Coben; Little, Brown)

Sue Feder Historical Mystery:
• The Lightning Rule, by Brett Ellen Block (Morrow)
• Oh Danny Boy, by Rhys Bowen (St. Martin’s Minotaur)
• The Bee’s Kiss, by Barbara Cleverly (Constable & Robinson)
• Dark Assassin, by Anne Perry (Ballantine)
• Messenger of Truth, by Jacqueline Winspear (Holt)

This year’s Macavity winners will be announced during this year’s Bouchercon, to be held in Anchorage, Alaska, at the end of September.

(Hat tip to Sarah Weinman.)