International Salutes to Crime

I’ve been away from Rap Sheet headquarters for the last few days, so I was delayed in reporting two morsels of crime-fiction awards news.

First off, organizers of New Zealand’s annual Ngaio Marsh Awards have released their longlist of works vying for 2026 Best Novel honors:

• Lucky Thing, by Tom Baragwanath (Text)
• Carved in Blood, by Michael Bennett (Simon & Schuster)
• Softly Calls the Devil, by Christopher Blake (Bonnier Echo)
• The Birds Began to Sing, by Jeffrey Buchanan (Text)
• Black Silk and Buried Secrets, by Deborah Challinor (HarperCollins)
• The Deadly Dispute, by Amanda Hampson (Penguin)
• Bella Donna, by Jill Johnson (Black & White/Bonnier)
• The Good Father, by Liam McIlvanney (Bonnier)
• When the Deep, Dark Bush Swallows You Whole, by Geoff
Parkes (Penguin)
• The Vanishing Place, by Zoë Rankin (Moa Press)
• Hooked Up, by Fiona Sussman (Bateman)
• A Beautiful Family, by Jennifer Trevelyan (Allen & Unwin)

The finalists for this year’s best Novel, Best First Novel, and Best Kids/YA prizes are to be announced within the next couple of months.

* * *

Meanwhile, the International Association of Crime Writers, North American Branch, declared earlier this week that Ron Currie’s The Savage Noble Death of Babs Dionne (Putnam) is the winner of the 2026 Hammett Prize for “literary excellence in crime writing.” Also in contention for that accolade were El Dorado Drive, by Megan Abbott (Putnam); Party of Liars, by Kelsey Cox (Minotaur); The Big Empty, by Robert Crais (Putnam); and The Lizard, by Domenic Stansberry (Molotov Editions).

Congratulations to all of the nominees!