We Certainly Know Bublitz’s Name Now

Something unusual happened in New Zealand during last night’s presentation of the 2022 Ngaio Marsh Awards for crime fiction: the same book, Jacqueline Bublitz’s Before You Knew My Name (Allen & Unwin), scooped up both Best Novel and Best First Novel honors.

“Ngaio Marsh Awards founder Craig Sisterson noted,” according to a news release, “that while a few excellent debuts have been shortlisted for both categories over the past several years, Before You Knew My Name is the first book to ever win two Ngaio Marsh Awards. [Taranaki author] Bublitz also joins Christchurch author and international bestseller Paul Cleave, a three-time Best Novel winner, as the only Kiwi storytellers with multiple Ngaios. So far.” That same press alert goes on to mention that “The two Ngaio Marsh Awards add to a list of accolades for Bublitz’s debut that include winning General Fiction Book of the Year at the ABIA Awards, being shortlisted for the CWA Gold Dagger in the UK, and winning the Debut Crime and Readers’ Choice prizes at the Davitt Awards of Sisters in Crime Australia.”

So what does Bublitz’s yarn entail? Here’s the synopsis: “While Before You Knew My Name shares an inciting incident familiar to any viewer of U.S. cop shows—a jogger in New York City finds the body of a young woman—in her debut Bublitz flips the script by taking readers deep into the lives of Alice and Ruby, the victim and the jogger, rather than the detectives.” The book was first published in May 2021, but an American edition won’t reach stores until November 1.

Although Bubitz’s tale grabs today’s headlines, let us recognize as well the other works pitted against Before You Knew My Name. Also nominated in the Best Novel category were The Devils You Know, by Ben Sanders (Allen & Unwin); She’s a Killer, by Kirsten McDougall (Te Herenga Waka University Press); Quiet in Her Bones, by Nalini Singh (Hachette); The Quiet People, by Paul Cleave (Upstart Press); and Nancy Business, by R.W.R. McDonald (Allen & Unwin). Contending, too, for Best First Novel recognition were Isobar Precinct, by Angelique Kasmara (Cuba Press); Waking the Tiger, by Mark Wightman (Hobeck); Small Mouth Demon, by Matt Zwartz (Poetry in Motion); and Shadow Over Edmund Street, by Suzanne Frankham (Journeys to Words).

Congratulations to all of this year’s Ngaio Marsh nominees!