Is It That Time Already?

Just when I thought it was going to be a nice, slow day, first came the announcement about Sue Grafton winning the Cartier Diamond Dagger Award. And now arrives the Mystery Writers of America’s (MWA) list of its 2008 Edgar Allan Poe Award nominees. Without further ado, here are this year’s contenders:

Best Novel
• Christine Falls, by Benjamin Black (Henry Holt)
• Priest, by Ken Bruen (St. Martin’s Minotaur)
• The Yiddish Policemen’s Union, by Michael Chabon (HarperCollins)
• Soul Patch, by Reed Farrel Coleman (Bleak House Books)
• Down River, by John Hart (St. Martin’s Minotaur)

Best First Novel by an American Author
• Missing Witness, by Gordon Campbell (Morrow)
• In the Woods, by Tana French (Viking)
• Snitch Jacket, by Christopher Goffard (The Rookery Press)
• Head Games, by Craig McDonald (Bleak House Books)
• Pyres, by Derek Nikitas (St. Martin’s Minotaur)

Best Paperback Original
• Queenpin, by Megan Abbott (Simon & Schuster)
• Blood of Paradise, by David Corbett (Mortalis)
• Cruel Poetry, by Vicki Hendricks (Serpent’s Tail)
• Robbie’s Wife, by Russell Hill (Hard Case Crime)
• Who Is Conrad Hirst? by Kevin Wignall (Simon & Schuster)

Best Fact Crime
• The Birthday Party, by Stanley Alpert (Putnam)
• Reclaiming History: The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy, by Vincent Bugliosi (Norton)
• Chasing Justice: My Story of Freeing Myself After Two Decades on Death Row for a Crime I Didn’t Commit, by Kerry Max Cook (Morrow)
• Relentless Pursuit: A True Story of Family, Murder, and the Prosecutor Who Wouldn’t Quit, by Kevin Flynn (Putnam)
• Sacco & Vanzetti: The Men, The Murders, and the Judgment of Mankind, by Bruce Watson (Viking)

Best Critical/Biographical
• The Triumph of the Thriller: How Cops, Crooks, and Cannibals Captured Popular Fiction, by Patrick Anderson (Random House)
• A Counter-History of Crime Fiction: Supernatural, Gothic, Sensational, by Maurizio Ascari (Palgrave Macmillan)
• Deviance in Contemporary Crime Fiction, by Christiana Gregoriou (Palgrave Macmillan)
• Arthur Conan Doyle: A Life in Letters, by Jon Lellenberg, Daniel Stashower, and Charles Foley (Penguin Press)
• Chester Gould: A Daughter’s Biography of the Creator of Dick Tracy, by Jean Gould O’Connell (McFarland & Company)

Best Short Story
• “The Catch,” by Mark Ammons (from Still Waters, edited by Kate Flora, Ruth McCarty, and Susan Oleksiw; Level Best Books)
• “Blue Note,” by Stuart M. Kaminsky (from Chicago Blues, edited by Libby Fischer Hellmann; Bleak House Books)
• “Hardly Knew Her,” by Laura Lippman (from Dead Man’s Hand, edited by Otto Penzler; Harcourt)
• “The Golden Gopher,” by Susan Straight (from Los Angeles Noir, edited by Denise Hamilton; Akashic Books
• “Uncle,” by Daniel Woodrell (from A Hell of a Woman, edited by Megan Abbott; Busted Flush Press)

Best Juvenile
• The Name of This Book Is Secret, by Pseudonymous Bosch (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers)
• Shadows on Society Hill, by Evelyn Coleman (American Girl Publications)
• Deep and Dark and Dangerous, by Mary Downing Hahn (Clarion Books)
• The Night Tourist, by Katherine Marsh (Hyperion Books for Young Readers)
• Sammy Keyes and the Wild Things, by Wendelin Van Draanen (Knopf)

Best Young Adult
• Rat Life, by Tedd Arnold (Dial Books for Young Readers)
• Diamonds in the Shadow, by Caroline B. Cooney (Random House Children’s Books)
• Touching Snow, by M. Sindy Felin (Atheneum Books for Young Readers)
• Blood Brothers, by S.A. Harazin (Random House Children’s Books)
• Fragments, by Jeffry W. Johnston (Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing)

Best Play
• If/Then, by David Foley (International Mystery Writers’ Festival)
• Panic, by Joseph Goodrich (International Mystery Writers’ Festival)
• Books, by Stuart M. Kaminsky (International Mystery Writers’ Festival)

Best Television Episode Teleplay
• “It’s Alive,” Dexter, teleplay by Daniel Cerone (Showtime)
• “Yahrzeit,” Waking the Dead, teleplay by Declan Croghan and Barbara Machin (BBC America)
• “Pie-Lette,” Pushing Daisies, teleplay by Bryan Fuller (ABC/Warner Bros Television)
• “Senseless,” Law & Order: Criminal Intent, teleplay by Julie Martin and Siobhan Byrne O’Connor (Wolf Films/NBC Universal)
• “Pilot,” Burn Notice, teleplay by Matt Nix (USA Network/Fox Television Studios)

Best Motion Picture Screenplay
• Eastern Promises, screenplay by Steven Knight (Focus Features)
• The Lookout, screenplay by Scott Frank (Miramax)
• Michael Clayton, screenplay by Tony Gilroy (Warner Bros. Pictures)
• No Country for Old Men, screenplay by Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, based on the book by Cormac McCarthy (Miramax)
• Zodiac, screenplay by James Vanderbilt, based on the book by Robert Graysmith(Warner Bros. Pictures)

The Simon & Schuster/Mary Higgins Clark Award
• In Cold Pursuit, by Sarah Andrews (St. Martin’s Minotaur)
• Wild Indigo, by Sandi Ault (Berkley Prime Crime)
• Inferno, by Karen Harper (Mira Books)
• The First Stone, by Judith Kelman (Berkley Prime Crime)
• Deadman’s Switch, by Barbara Seranella (St. Martin’s Minotaur)

In addition, the Robert L. Fish Memorial Award goes to “The Catch,” by Mark Ammons (from Still Waters, edited by Kate Flora, Ruth McCarty, and Susan Oleksiw; Level Best Books). The Center for the Book in the Library of Congress and Kate’s Mystery Books, owned by Kate Mattes, will both be getting Raven Awards. And Bill Pronzini has already been designated to receive the 2008 Grand Master Award.

All of the other prize winners will be announced during the MWA’s 62nd Gala Banquet, to be held on May 1, 2008 at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in New York City.

For more information, look here.

READ MORE: “The Edgar Awards Nominations Open Thread,” by Sarah Weinman (Confessions of an Idiosyncratic Mind).