No Longer Left Hanging

The Crime Writers of Canada (CWC) announced the winners of its 24th annual Arthur Ellis Awards during a dinner held tonight in Toronto, Canada. These commendations celebrate “the best Canadian crime writing published in 2006.” And the recipients are ...

Best Novel: Honour Among Men, by Barbara Fradkin (RendezVous Press)

Also nominated: Lone Wolf, by Linwood Barclay (Bantam/RHC); Every Secret Thing, by Emma Cole (Allison & Busby); Break No Bones, by Kathy Reichs (Scribner/Simon & Schuster); and Piece of My Heart, by Peter Robinson (McClelland & Stewart)

Best First Novel: Sign of the Cross, by Anne Emery (ECW Press)

Also nominated: The Elvis Interviews, Glen Bonham (Battlefield Publishing); Reparations, by Stephen Kimber (HarperCollins Canada); Dead Money, by Grant McCrea (Random House Canada); and Deadly Lessons, by David Russell (RendezVous Press)

Best Non-fiction: High: Confessions of a Pot Smoker, Brian O’Dea (Random House Canada)

Also nominated: The Desperate Ones: Forgotten Canadian Outlaws, by Edward Butts (Dundurn Press); The Brotherhoods: The True Story of Two Cops Who Murdered for the Mafia, by Guy Lawson and William Oldham, (Scribner/Simon & Schuster); To the Grave: A Spectacular RCMP Sting, by Mike McIntyre (Great Plains Publications); and Who Named the Knife? by Linda Spalding (McClelland & Stewart)

Best Short Story: “Fuzzy Wuzzy,” by Dennis Richard Murphy (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, August 2006)

Also nominated: “Lady in Violet Satin,” by Vicki Cameron (Storyteller, Fall 2006); “The Curious Case of the Book Baron,” by Karl El-Koura (Storyteller, Spring 2006); “Voices from the Deep,” by Barbara Fradkin (in Dead in the Water, edited by Violette Malan and Therese Greenwood; RendezVous); and “Canadian Diamonds,” by Jennifer Geens (Storyteller, Summer 2006)

Best Juvenile: Hamish X and the Cheese Pirates, by Sean Cullen (Penguin Canada)

Also nominated: The Mystery of the Graffiti Ghoul, Marty Chan (Thistledown Press); The Devil, The Banshee and Me, by L.M. Falcone (Kidscan Press); Tell, by Norah McClintock (Orca); and All In, by Monique Polak (James Lorimer)

Best Unpublished First Crime Novel (the Unhanged Arthur): Margarita Nights, by Phyllis Smallman

Also nominated: Murder in a Cold Climate, by Jennifer Hemstock; Ego Tenderloin, by Meika Erinn McClurg; Last Date, by Rosemary McCracken; and Condemned, by Kevin Thornton

No “Arthur” was given this year in the category of Best Crime Writing in French, due to what the CWC reported was “the low number of submissions.”

Previous winners of these prizes include Howard Engel, Eric Wright, Peter Robinson, L.R. Wright, Giles Blunt, Carol Shields, William Deverell, Gail Bowen, Kathy Reichs, and Rosemary Aubert. The Arthurs take their name from the pseudonym of Canada’s official--and now unemployed--hangman.