Carrying on Stout Traditions

Alaska crime novelist Dana Stabenow has been named the winner of the 2012 Nero Award for her 18th Kate Shugak mystery novel, Though Not Dead, published last year by Minotaur. The Nero is given out annually by The Wolfe Pack, a New York City-based organization devoted to Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe detective yarns. That commendation recognizes “the best American mystery written in the tradition of Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe stories.”

Also in the running for this prize: Guilt by Association, by Marcia Clark (Mulholland); The Silent Girl, by Tess Gerritsen (Ballantine); The House of Silk, by Anthony Horowitz (Mulholland); Spiral, by Paul McEuen (The Dial Press); and Black Orchid Blues, by Persia Walker (Akashic).

A Wolfe Pack news release also explains that Robert Lopresti will receive this year’s Black Orchid Novella Award, which celebrates “the novella format popularized by Rex Stout.” Lopresti’s winning tale is titled “The Red Envelope.”

Congratulations to both winners!