Who’s Peculier Now?

Organizers of this year’s Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival (to be held in the spa town of Harrogate, England, July 19-22) have announced their longlist of nominees for the 2018 Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year award. The 18 contenders include both heavy hitters and lesser-knowns.

• Want You Gone, by Chris Brookmyre (Little, Brown)
• The Midnight Line, by Lee Child (Bantam Press)
• The Seagull, by Ann Cleeves (Macmillan)
• Little Deaths, by Emma Flint (Picador)
• The Chalk Pit, by Elly Griffiths (Quercus)
• The Dry, by Jane Harper (Macmillan)
• Spook Street, by Mick Herron (John Murray)
• Death at Fountains Abbey, by Antonia Hodgson (Hodder & Stoughton)
• He Said, She Said, by Erin Kelly (Hodder & Stoughton)
• Sirens, by Joseph Knox (Doubleday)
• The Accident on A35, by Graeme Macrae Burnet (Contraband)
• You Don’t Know Me, by Imran Mahmood (Michael Joseph)
• Insidious Intent, by Val McDermid (Little, Brown)
• The Long Drop, by Denise Mina (Harvill Secker)
• A Rising Man, by Abir Mukherjee (Harvill Secker)
• Rather Be the Devil, by Ian Rankin (Orion)
• The Intrusions, by Stav Sherez (Faber and Faber)
• Persons Unknown, by Susie Steiner (The Borough Press)

Festival officials tells us, “The shortlist of six titles will be announced on 27 May, followed by a six-week promotion in libraries and in W.H. Smith stores [across Britain]. The overall winner will be decided by the panel of judges, alongside a public vote. The public vote opens on 1 July and closes 14 July at https://www.theakstons.co.uk.”