Friday, May 10, 2019

Going Long for the Daggers

Thanks to Ayo Onatade and Shotsmag Confidential, we now have the longlists of nominees for the British Crime Writers’ Association’s 2019 Dagger Awards. These books and authors were announced earlier this evening during CrimeFest (May 9-12), in Bristol, England.

CWA Gold Dagger:
All the Hidden Truths, by Claire Askew (Hodder & Stoughton)
Snap, by Belinda Bauer (Bantam Press)
The Mobster’s Lament, by Ray Celestin (Mantle)
The Puppet Show, by M.W. Craven (Constable)
Body & Soul, by John Harvey (Heinemann)
What We Did, by Christobel Kent (Sphere)
Unto Us a Son Is Given, by Donna Leon (Heinemann)
Fade to Grey, by John Lincoln (No Exit Press)
Cold Bones, by David Mark (Mulholland)
American by Day, by Derek B. Miller (Doubleday)
Smoke and Ashes, by Abir Mukherjee (Harvill Secker)
Salt Lane, by William Shaw (Riverrun)
Before She Knew Him, by Peter Swanson (Faber and Faber)
The Fire Court, by Andrew Taylor (Harper)
A Station on the Path to Somewhere Better, by Benjamin Wood (Scribner)

CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger:
Give Me Your Hand, by Megan Abbott (Picador)
Thirteen, by Steve Cavanagh (Orion)
Safe Houses, by Dan Fesperman (Head of Zeus)
The Stranger Diaries, by Elly Griffiths (Quercus)
No Tomorrow, by Luke Jennings (John Murray)
Lives Laid Away, by Stephen Mack Jones (Soho Crime)
The Wolf and the Watchman, by Niklas Natt och Dag (John Murray)
Homegrown Hero, by Khurrum Rahman (HQ)
To the Lions, by Holly Watt (Raven)
Memo from Turner, by Tim Willocks (Jonathan Cape)

CWA John Creasey (New Blood) Dagger:
Motherland, by G.D. Abson (Mirror)
All the Hidden Truths, by Claire Askew (Hodder & Stoughton)
The Boy at the Door, by Alex Dahl (Head of Zeus)
When Darkness Calls, by Mark Griffin (Piatkus)
Scrublands, by Chris Hammer (Wildfire)
Turn a Blind Eye, by Vicky Newham (HQ)
Blood & Sugar, by Laura Shepherd-Robinson (Mantle)
Something in the Water, by Catherine Steadman (Simon & Schuster)
The Chestnut Man, by Søren Sveistrup (Michael Joseph)
Overkill, by Vanda Symon (Orenda)

CWA ALCS Gold Dagger for Non-fiction:
All That Remains: A Life in Death, by Sue Black (Doubleday)
An Unexplained Death: The True Story of a Body at the Belvedere,
by Mikita Brottman (Canongate)
Trace: Who Killed Maria James?, by Rachael Brown (Scribe UK)
Murder by the Book: A Sensational Chapter in Victorian Crime,
by Claire Harman (Viking)
The Feather Thief: Beauty, Obsession, and the Natural History Heist of the Century, by Kirk Wallace Johnson (Hutchinson)
Eve Was Shamed: How British Justice Is Failing Women, by Helena Kennedy (Chatto & Windus)
In Your Defence: Stories of Life and Law, by Sarah Longford (Doubleday)
The Spy and the Traitor: The Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold War, by Ben Macintyre (Viking)
The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper, by Hallie Rubenhold (Doubleday)
My Life with Murderers: Behind Bars with the World’s Most
Violent Men
, by David Wilson (Sphere)

CWA International Dagger:
A Long Night in Paris, by Dov Alfon,
translated by Daniella Zamir (Maclehose Press)
Weeping Waters, by Karin Brynard,
translated by Maya Fowler and Isobel Dixon (World Noir)
The Cold Summer, by Gianrico Carofiglio,
translated by Howard Curtis (Bitter Lemon Press)
Newcomer, by Keigo Higashino,
translated by Giles Murray (Little, Brown)
The Root of Evil, by Håkan Nesser,
translated by Sarah Death (Mantle)
The Forger, by Cay Rademacher,
translated by Peter Millar (Arcadia)
The Overnight Kidnapper, by Andrea Camilleri,
translated by Stephen Sartarelli (Mantle)
The Courier, by Kjell Ola Dahl,
translated by Don Bartlett (Orenda)
Slugger, by Martin Holmén,
translated by A.A. Prime (Pushkin Vertigo)
The Katherina Code, by Jørn Lier Horst,
translated by Anne Bruce (Michael Joseph)

CWA Sapere Historical Dagger:
Blood & Sugar, by Laura Shepherd-Robinson (Mantle)
Destroying Angel, by S.G. Maclean (Quercus)
Gallows Court, by Martin Edwards (Head of Zeus)
Smoke and Ashes, by Abir Mukherjee (Harvill Secker)
Tombland, by C.J. Sansom (Mantle)
The Angel’s Mark, by S.W. Perry (Corvus)
The House on Half Moon Street, by Alex Reeve (Raven)
The Mathematical Bridge, by Jim Kelly (Allison & Busby)
The Mobster’s Lament, by Ray Celestin (Mantle)
The Quaker, by Liam McIlvanney (Harper)

CWA Short Story Dagger:
“Room Number Two,” by Andrea Camilleri (from Death at Sea,
by Andrea Camilleri; Mantle)
“Strangers in a Pub,” by Martin Edwards (from Ten Year Stretch, edited by Martin Edwards and Adrian Muller; No Exit Press)
“How Many Cats Have You Killed?,” by Mick Herron
(from Ten Year Stretch)
“Death Becomes Her,” by Syd Moore (from The Strange Casebook,
by Syd Moore; Point Blank)
“The Dummies’ Guide to Serial Killing,” by Danuta Reah (from The Dummies’ Guide to Serial Killing and Other Fantastic Female Fables, by Danuta Reah; Fantastic)
“I Detest Mozart,” by Teresa Solana (from The First Historic Serial Killers, by Teresa Solana; Bitter Lemon Press)
“Paradise Gained,” by Teresa Solana (from The First Historic
Serial Killers
)
“Bag Man,” by Lavie Tidhar (from The Outcast Hours, edited by Mahvesh Murad and Jared Shurin; Solaris)

CWA Dagger in the Library:
(Honoring “a body of work by an established crime writer that has long been popular with borrowers from libraries.”)
M.C. Beaton
Simon Beckett
Mark Billingham
Christopher Brookmyre
John Connolly
Kate Ellis
Sophie Hannah
Graham Masterton
Denise Mina
C.J. Sansom
Cath Staincliffe
Jacqueline Winspear

CWA Debut Dagger (for unpublished writers):
WAKE, by Shelley Burr
Self-Help for Serial Killers: Let Your Creativity Bloom, by Mairi Campbell-Jack
The Mourning Light, by Jerry Crause
The Fruits of Rashness, by Michael Fleming
Down the Well, by Carol Glaser
Hardways, by Catherine Hendricks
The Right Man, by Anna Maloney
The Firefly, by David Smith
A Thin Sharp Blade, by Fran Smith
A Wolf’s Clothing, by Matthew Smith

I’m particularly pleased to see among these numerous contenders Andrew Taylor’s Fire Court, John Harvey’s Body & Soul, Laura Shepherd-Robinson’s Blood & Sugar, Niklas Natt och Dag’s The Wolf and the Watchman, Martin Edwards’ Gallows Court, and Hallie Rubenhold’s The Five, all of which I have read and enjoyed in recent months. But since I’m not a member of any Dagger judging committee, my opinion doesn’t exactly carry much weight.

Shortlists of this year’s Dagger contestants are supposed to be broadcast later this summer, with the winners set to be declared during a special dinner in London on October 24. That is also the occasion on which the CWA will honor Robert Goddard with its 2019 Diamond Dagger. The Diamond Dagger recognizes “authors whose crime writing careers have been marked by sustained excellence, and who have made a significant contribution to the genre.”

For more information, visit the CWA Web site or e-mail admin@thecwa.co.uk. Rap Sheet correspondent Ali Karim’s video of last night’s Dagger Award announcements can be viewed here.

* * *

One final note: During tonight’s Dagger Awards ceremony at CrimeFest, it was also announced that Ray Bazowski’s “A Perfect Murderer” has won the 2019 Margery Allingham Short Story Competition (for an unpublished work), while Rosie de Vekey has been named as the runner-up in this contest for her story “Decluttering.” The Allingham prize is presented annually thanks to a joint initiative by the Margery Allingham Society and the CWA.

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