All Eyes on the Edgars

Following on yesterday’s announcement about finalists for the 2020 Agatha Awards, the Mystery Writers of America (MWA) today broadcast its lists of nominees for this year’s Edgar Allan Poe Awards. The individual categories can be found below, including a new one—partnering the MWA with publisher G.P. Putnam’s Sons—that honors author Sue Grafton, who passed away in December 2017.

Best Novel:
• Fake Like Me, by Barbara Bourland (Grand Central)
• The Stranger Diaries, by Elly Griffiths (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
• The River, by Peter Heller (Knopf)
• Smoke and Ashes, by Abir
Mukherjee (Pegasus)
• Good Girl, Bad Girl, by Michael
Robotham (Scribner)

Best First Novel by an American Author:
• My Lovely Wife,
by Samantha Downing (Berkley)
• Miracle Creek,
by Angie Kim (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
• The Good Detective,
by John McMahon (Putnam)
• The Secrets We Kept, by Lara Prescott (Knopf)
• Three-Fifths, by John Vercher (Agora)
• American Spy, by Lauren Wilkinson (Random House)

Best Paperback Original:
• Dread of Winter, by Susan Alice Bickford (Kensington)
• Freedom Road, by William Lashner (Thomas & Mercer)
• Blood Relations, by Jonathan Moore (Mariner)
• February’s Son, by Alan Parks (World Noir)
• The Hotel Neversink, by Adam O’Fallon Price (Tin House)
• The Bird Boys, by Lisa Sandlin (Cinco Puntos Press)

Best Fact Crime:
• The Ghosts of Eden Park: The Bootleg King, the Women Who
Pursued Him, and the Murder that Shocked Jazz-Age America, by Karen Abbott (Crown)
• The Less People Know About Us: A Mystery of Betrayal, Family Secrets, and Stolen Identity, by Axton Betz-Hamilton (Grand Central)
• American Predator: The Hunt for the Most Meticulous Serial Killer of the 21st Century, by Maureen Callahan (Viking)
• Norco ’80: The True Story of the Most Spectacular Bank Robbery in American History, by Peter Houlahan (Counterpoint Press)
• Indecent Advances: A Hidden History of True Crime and Prejudice Before Stonewall, by James Polchin (Counterpoint Press)

Best Critical/Biographical:
• Hitchcock and the Censors, by John Billheimer (University
Press of Kentucky)
• Beyond the Thirty-Nine Steps: A Life of John Buchan,
by Ursula Buchan (Bloomsbury)
• The Hooded Gunman: An Illustrated History of Collins Crime Club,
by John Curran (Collins Crime Club)
• Medieval Crime Fiction: A Critical Overview, by Anne
McKendry (McFarland)
• The Mutual Admiration Society: How Dorothy L. Sayers and Her Oxford Circle Remade the World for Women, by Mo Moulton (Basic)

Best Short Story:
• “Turistas,” by Hector Acosta (from ¡Pa’Que Tu Lo Sepas!,
edited by Angel Luis Colón; Down & Out)
• “One of These Nights,” by Livia Llewellyn (from Cutting Edge:
New Stories of Mystery and Crime by Women Writers, edited by Joyce Carol Oates; Akashic)
• “The Passenger,” by Kirsten Tranter (from Sydney Noir, edited by John Dale; Akashic)
• “Home at Last,” by Sam Wiebe (from Die Behind the Wheel:
Crime Fiction Inspired by the Music of Steely Dan, edited by Brian Thornton; Down & Out)
• “Brother’s Keeper,” by Dave Zeltserman (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, May/June 2019)

Best Juvenile:
• The Collected Works of Gretchen Oyster, by Cary Fagan (Tundra)
• Eventown, by Corey Ann Haydu (Katherine Tegen)
• The Whispers, by Greg Howard (Putnam Books for Young Readers)
• All the Greys on Greene Street, by Laura Tucker (Viking Books
for Young Readers)
• Me and Sam-Sam Handle the Apocalypse, by Susan Vaught
(Paula Wiseman)

Best Young Adult:
• Catfishing on CatNet, by Naomi Kritzer (Tor Teen)
• Killing November, by Adriana Mather (Knopf Books for Young Readers)
• Patron Saints of Nothing, by Randy Ribay (Kokila)
• The Deceivers,
by Kristen Simmons (Tor Teen)
• Wild and Crooked,
by Leah Thomas (Bloomsbury)

Best Television Episode Teleplay:
• “Season 5, Episode 3” – Line of Duty, teleplay by Jed Mercurio (Acorn TV)
• “Season 5, Episode 4” – Line of Duty, teleplay by Jed Mercurio (Acorn TV)
• “Episode 1” – Dublin Murders, teleplay by Sarah Phelps (STARZ)
• “Episode 1” – Manhunt, teleplay by Ed Whitmore (Acorn TV)
• “Episode 1” – The Wisting, teleplay by Katherine Valen Zeiner and Trygve Allister Diesen (Sundance Now)

Robert L. Fish Memorial Award:
“There’s a Riot Goin’ On,” by Derrick Harriell (from Milwaukee Noir, edited by Tim Hennessey; Akashic)

The Simon & Schuster Mary Higgins Clark Award:
• The Night Visitors, by Carol Goodman (Morrow)
• One Night Gone, by Tara Laskowski (Graydon House)
• Strangers at the Gate, by Catriona McPherson (Minotaur)
• Where the Missing Go, by Emma Rowley (Kensington)
• The Murder List, by Hank Phillippi Ryan (Forge)

The G.P. Putnam’s Sons Sue Grafton Memorial Award:
• Shamed, by Linda Castillo (Minotaur)
• Borrowed Time, by Tracy Clark (Kensington)
• The Missing Ones, by Edwin Hill (Kensington)
• The Satapur Moonstone, by Sujata Massey (Soho Crime)
• The Alchemist’s Illusion, by Gigi Pandian (Midnight Ink)
• Girl Gone Missing, by Marcie R. Rendon (Cincos Puntos Press)

The winners of these many coveted commendations will be announced during the MWA’s 74th Gala Banquet, to be held on April 30 at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in New York City.

Recipients of the MWA’s 2020 Grand Master, Raven, and Ellery Queen awards were previously broadcast.