Rewarding the Best of British Crime

What splendid news! In an extremely competitive category, Chris Whitaker’s We Begin at End has picked up the British Crime Writers’ Association’s 2021 Gold Dagger award for crime novel of the year. The announcement was made this evening in London, during an online ceremony. A news release quotes CWA chair Maxim Jakubowski as saying: “This year’s Gold Dagger shortlist featured remarkable books, but We Begin at the End is an astoundingly beautiful and moving achievement in storytelling. Chris’s talent shone through when we awarded him the John Creasey Dagger in 2017 [for his first novel, Tall Oaks]. It’s inspiring to see him now take Gold, and I’m delighted that the CWA judges recognised this now acclaimed author from the very start.”

Below is the complete roster of this year’s Dagger Award winners.

Gold Dagger: We Begin at the End, by Chris Whitaker (Zaffre). Highly commended: Blacktop Wasteland, by S.A. Cosby (Headline); House of Correction, by Nicci French (Simon & Schuster)

Also nominated: City of Ghosts, by Ben Creed (Welbeck); Troubled Blood, by Robert Galbraith (Sphere); The Postscript Murders, by Elly Griffiths (Quercus); and Midnight Atlanta, by Thomas Mullen
(Little, Brown)

Ian Fleming Steel Dagger: When She Was Good, by Michael
Robotham (Sphere)

Also nominated: Troubled Blood, by Robert Galbraith (Sphere); The Nothing Man, by Catherine Ryan Howard (Atlantic); The Devil and the Dark Water, by Stuart Turton (Raven); One by One, by Ruth Ware (Harvill Secker); and We Begin at the End, by Chris Whitaker (Zaffre)

John Creasey (New Blood) Dagger: The Creak on the Stairs,
by Eva Björg Ægisdóttir (Orenda)

Also nominated: City of Ghosts, by Ben Creed (Welbeck); The One That Got Away, by Egan Hughes (Sphere); The Bone Jar, by S.W. Kane (Thomas & Mercer); Fortune Favours the Dead, by Stephen Spotswood (Wildfire); and Three Fifths, by John Vercher (Pushkin Press)

Sapere Books Historical Dagger: Midnight at Malabar House,
by Vaseem Khan (Hodder & Stoughton)

Also nominated: Snow, by John Banville (Faber and Faber); The Unwanted Dead, by Chris Lloyd (Orion Fiction); The City Under Siege, by Michael Russell (Constable); Skelton’s Guide to Domestic Poisons, by David S. Stafford (Allison & Busby); and The Mimosa Tree Mystery, by Ovidia Yu (Constable)

ALCS Gold Dagger for Non-fiction: Written in Bone: Hidden Stories in What We Leave Behind, by Sue Black (Doubleday)

Also nominated: We Keep the Dead Close: A Murder at Harvard and a Half Century of Silence, by Becky Cooper (Heinemann); These Are Not Gentle People, by Andrew Harding (MacLehose Press); Dancing with the Octopus: The Telling of a True Crime, by Debora Harding (Profile); The Book of Trespass: Crossing the Lines that Divide Us, by Nick Hayes (Bloomsbury Circus); and Agent Sonya: Lover, Mother, Soldier, Spy, by Ben MacIntyre (Viking)

Crime Fiction in Translation Dagger: The Disaster Tourist, by Yun Ko-eun, translated by Lizzie Buehler (Serpent’s Tail)

Also nominated: Anxious People, by Fredrik Backman, translated by Neil Smith (Michael Joseph); The Coral Bride, by Roxanne Bouchard, translated by David Warriner (Orenda); Three, by D.A. Mishani, translated by Jessica Cohen (Riverrun); To Cook a Bear, by Mikael Niemi, translated by Deborah Bragan-Turner (MacLehose Press); and The Seven Doors, by Agnes Ravatn, translated by Rosie Hedger (Orenda)

Short Story Dagger: “Monsters,” by Clare Mackintosh (from First Edition: Celebrating 21 Years of Goldsboro Books, edited by David Headley and Daniel Gedeon; The Dome Press)

Also nominated: “A Dog Is for Life, Not Just for Christmas,” by Robert Scragg (from Afraid of the Christmas Lights, edited by Robert Scragg; Robert Scragg); “Deathbed,” by Elle Croft (from Afraid of the Light, edited by Robert Scragg; Robert Scragg); “Daddy Dearest,” by Dominic Nolan (from Afraid of the Light); “Hunted,” by Victoria Selman (from Afraid of the Christmas Lights); and “Planting Nan,” by James Delargy (from Afraid of the Light)

Dagger in the Library (“for a body of work by an established crime writer that has long been popular with borrowers from
libraries”): Peter May

Also nominated: C.L. Taylor, Lisa Jewell, James Oswald, Denise Mina, and L.J. Ross

Publishers’ Dagger (“awarded annually to the Best Crime and Mystery Publisher of the Year”): Head of Zeus

Also nominated: Faber and Faber, Michael Joseph, No Exit Press, Raven, and Viper

CWA Debut Dagger (for as-yet-unpublished novels): Deception, by Hannah Redding. Highly commended: Underwater, by Fiona McPhillips

Also nominated: The Looking Glass Spy, by Ashley Harrison; Rough Justice, by Biba Pearce; Lightfoot, by Edward Regenye; and Mandatory Reporting, by Jennifer Wilson O’Raghallaigh

In addition, Martina Cole has received the 2021 Diamond Dagger award for lifetime achievement.

There’s so much exceptional reading material cited here! If I’m disappointed at all with this year’s Dagger results, it’s only because Ben Creed’s City of Ghosts (which was nominated in two different categories), along with Stuart Turton’s The Devil and the Dark Water and Thomas Mullen’s Midnight Atlanta (both among my favorite books from 2020), didn’t walk away with commendations of their own.