Nero Favors Jones

Detroit-area author Stephen Mack Jones has won the 2018 Nero Award for his debut novel, August Snow (Soho Crime). That announcement was made last night during the Black Orchid Banquet held at Arno Ristorante in Manhattan. The Nero has been presented annually, ever since 1979, by the New York City-based Nero Wolfe/Archie Goodwin fan organization, The Wolfe Pack, to “the best American mystery written in the tradition of Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe stories.”

August Snow faced several strong contenders for this year’s prize: The Dime, by Kathleen Kent (Mulholland); The Lioness Is the Hunter, by Loren D. Estelman (Forge); Gone to Dust, by Matt Goldman (Forge); and Blood for Wine, by Warren C. Easley (Poisoned Pen Press).

Jones’ novel was previously honored with the 2017 Hammett Prize, presented this last summer. The author has a sequel, Lives Laid Away, due out from Soho in early January of next year.

(Hat tip to The Gumshoe Site.)

ADDENDUM: Thanks to Les Blatt at Classic Mysteries, we now know who received the 2018 Black Orchid Novella Award, which The Wolfe Pack also presented on December 1, in association with Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine. The winner is California writer Mark Bruce, whose story, “Minerva James and the Goddess of Justice,” will be published in AHMM sometime next summer.

Honorable mention went to a trio of other stories in contention for this year’s Black Orchid prize: “Angling for Justice," by Jennifer Jones; “Spring Fever,” by Jean-Pierce Forget; and “Monday's Mirage,” by Gabriel Valjan. Congratulations to all!