LibGuides: Dagger Awards: Gold Dagger

Title Box

Dagger Awards
Gold Dagger for Best Crime Novel

2020-2029

WINNER: Good Girl Bad Girl by Michael Robotham

Good Girl, Bad Girl (Cyrus Haven #1) by Robotham, Michael
Call Number: FIC ROBOT MIC CY1 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9781982103606
Publication Date: 2019-07-23
A girl is found hiding in a secret room in a house being renovated after a terrible crime. For weeks she has survived by sneaking out at night, stealing food for herself and two dogs that are kept in the garden. She doesn't appear on any missing person's file, or match the DNA of any murder victim. Six years later, still unidentified, the same girl is living in a secure children's home with a new name, Evie Cormac, when she initiates a court case demanding the right to be released as an adult. Psychologist Cyrus Haven is sent to interview Evie and decide if she's ready to go free, but Evie Cormac is unlike he's anyone he's ever met. She's damaged, destructive, and self-hating, yet possessed of a gift, or a curse, that makes her both fascinating and dangerous to be with--the ability to tell when someone is lying. Soon he is embroiled in her unique and dangerous world, his life in utmost peril.

Shortlist:

What You Pay For by Claire Askew
November Road by Lou Berney
Forced Confessions by John Fairfax
Jo Country by Mick Herron
Death in the East by Abir Mukherjee

November Road by Lou Berney
Call Number: Fiction B526n (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780062663849
Publication Date: 2018-10-09
Frank Guidry's luck has finally run out. A loyal street lieutenant to New Orleans' mob boss Carlos Marcello, Guidry has learned that everybody is expendable. But now it's his turn--he knows too much about the crime of the century: the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Within hours of JFK's murder, everyone with ties to Marcello is turning up dead, and Guidry suspects he's next: he was in Dallas on an errand for the boss less than two weeks before the president was shot. With few good options, Guidry hits the road to Las Vegas, to see an old associate--a dangerous man who hates Marcello enough to help Guidry vanish. Guidry knows that the first rule of running is "don't stop," but when he sees a beautiful housewife on the side of the road with a broken-down car, two little daughters and a dog in the back seat, he sees the perfect disguise to cover his tracks from the hit men on his tail. Posing as an insurance man, Guidry offers to help Charlotte reach her destination, California. If she accompanies him to Vegas, he can help her get a new car. For her, it's more than a car-- it's an escape. She's on the run too, from a stifling existence in small-town Oklahoma and a kindly husband who's a hopeless drunk. It's an American story: two strangers meet to share the open road west, a dream, a hope--and find each other on the way.

WINNER

We Begin at the End by Chris Whitaker

We Begin at the End by Chris Whitaker
Call Number: FIC WHITA CHR WE (Adult fiction)
ISBN: 9781250759665
Publication Date: 2021-03-02
Thirty years ago, a teenage Vincent King was sent to prison. But now, he's served his sentence and is returning to his hometown. The hometown where his childhood best friend, Walk, is now the chief of police. The town where his childhood sweetheart, Star Radley, still lives. The same Star Radley whose sister he killed. Duchess, Star's daughter, is a self-proclaimed outlaw. She needs to be. Who else is going to take care of her and her five-year-old brother? Star is still dazzling, still beautiful, but she hasn't shined as bright since Vincent was sent away. Too often it's Duchess and Walk who are the ones taking care of her. But when Duchess exacts her own vigilante revenge, she will set into motion a series of events that threatens not only her own family, but everyone she grows close to. A crime thriller that will break your heart and a literary novel with a mystery at its core, We Begin at the End unforgettably examines how the choices we make can nudge us into the dangerous ground between good and evil.
We Begin at the End [E-Book] by Chris Whitaker
Call Number: FIC WHITA CHR WE Ebook (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9781250759672
Publication Date: 2021-03-02
We Begin at the End [Streaming audiobook] by Chris Whitaker
Call Number: FIC WHITA CHR WE Audiobk (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9781250778604
Publication Date: 2021

Highly Commended

Blacktop Wasteland by S. A. Cosby
House of Correction by Nicci French

Blacktop Wasteland by Cosby, S. A.
Call Number: FIC COSBY SA BL (Adult fiction)
ISBN: 9781250252685
Publication Date: 2020-07-14
A gritty, voice-driven thriller about a former getaway driver who thought he had escaped the criminal life who is pulled back in by race, poverty, and his own former life of crime. Beauregard "Bug" Montage is a man with many different titles: husband, father, friend, honest car mechanic. But before he gave it up, Bug used to be known from the hills of North Carolina to the beaches of Florida as the best Wheel Man on the East Coast. After a series of financial calamities, Bug feels he has no choice but to take one final job as the getaway driver for a daring diamond heist that could solve all his money troubles and allow him to go straight once and for all. Like "Ocean's Eleven" meets "Drive" (but with a mostly black cast of characters), Blacktop Wasteland is a searing, operatic story of sons living up (or down) to their fathers; of a heist gone sideways; of a man ground down by economic desperation; of fast cars and daring chases and identity and love.
Blacktop Wasteland [E-Book] by S. A. Cosby
Call Number: FIC COSBY SA BL Ebook (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9781250252678
Publication Date: 2020-07-14
Blacktop Wasteland [Streaming audiobook] by S. A. Cosby
Call Number: FIC COSBY SA BL Audiobk (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9781250751935
Publication Date: 2020

House of Correction by French, Nicci
Call Number: FIC FRENC NIC HO (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780063021341
Publication Date: 2020-10-27
Tabitha is accused of murder. She is in prison awaiting trial. There is a strong case against her, and she can?t remember what happened on December 21st. She is alone, frightened and confused. But somehow, from the confines of her cell, she needs to prove everyone wrong. House of Correction is beautifully written, clever, shocking, twisty, so believable and utterly compelling.

SHORTLIST

City of Ghosts by Ben Creed
Troubled Blood by Robert Galbraith
The Postscript Murders by Elly Griffiths
Midnight Atlanta by Thomas Mullen

Troubled Blood (Cormoran Strike #5) by Galbraith, Robert
Call Number: FIC GALBR ROB C5 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780316498937
Publication Date: 2020-09-15
While visiting his family in Cornwall, Private Detective Cormoran Strike agrees to take on a cold case involving a woman who went missing in mysterious circumstances in 1974, and as Strike and his partner in the agency, Robin Ellacott, investigate the disappearance, they come up against a fiendishly complex case with leads that include tarot cards, a psychopathic serial killer, and witnesses who cannot all be trusted.
Troubled Blood [E-Book] (Cormoran strike #5) by Robert Galbraith
Call Number: FIC GALBR ROB C5 Ebook (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9780316498999
Publication Date: 2020-09-15
Troubled Blood [Streaming audiobook] (Cormoran strike #5) by Robert Galbraith
Call Number: FIC GALBR ROB C5 Audiobk (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9781549106613
Publication Date: 2020

The Postscript Murders (Harbinder Kaur #2) by Elly Griffiths
Call Number: FIC GRIFF ELL H2 (Adult fiction)
ISBN: 9780358418610
Publication Date: 2021-03-02

WINNER

Sunset Swing by Ray Celestin

SHORT LIST:

Before you Knew My Name by Jacqueline Bublitz
Razorblade Tears by S. A. Cosby
The Unwilling by John Hart
The Shadows of Men by Abir Mukherjee
The Trawlerman by William Shaw

Razorblade Tears by S. A. Cosby
Call Number: FIC COSBY SA RA (Adult fiction)
ISBN: 9781250252708
Publication Date: 2021-07-06
The Unwilling by Hart, John
Call Number: FIC HART JOH UN (Adult nonfiction)
ISBN: 9781250167729
Publication Date: 2021-02-02
Gibby's older brothers have already been to Vietnam. One died there. The other came back misunderstood and hard, a decorated killer now freshly released from a three-year stint in prison. Jason won't speak of the war or of his time behind bars, but he wants a relationship with the younger brother he hasn't known for years. Determined to make that connection, he coaxes Gibby into a day at the lake: long hours of sunshine and whiskey and older women. The day turns ugly when the four encounter a prison transfer bus on a stretch of empty road. Beautiful but drunk, one of the women taunts the prisoners, leading to a riot on the bus. When the woman is murdered soon after, suspicion turns to Jason. When the second woman is kidnapped, the police suspect Gibby, too.

WINNER

The Kingdoms of Savannah by George Dawes Green

The Kingdoms of Savannah by George Dawes Green
Call Number: FIC GREEN GEOD KI (Adult fiction)
ISBN: 9781250767448
Publication Date: 2022-07-19
It begins quietly on a balmy Southern night as some locals gather at Bo Peep's, one of the town's favorite watering holes. Within an hour, however, a man will be murdered and his companion will be "disappeared." An unlikely detective, Morgana Musgrove, doyenne of Savannah society, is called upon to unravel the mystery of these crimes. Morgana is an imperious, demanding, and conniving woman, whose four grown children are weary of her schemes. But one by one she inveigles them into helping with her investigation, and soon the family uncovers some terrifying truths--truths that will rock Savannah's power structure to its core. Moving from the homeless encampments that ring the city to the stately homes of Savannah's elite, Green's novel brilliantly depicts the underbelly of a city with a dark history and the strangely mesmerizing dysfunction of a complex family.

FINALISTS

The Lost Man of Bombay by Vaseem Khan
The Winter Guest by W.C. Ryan
A Killing in November by Simon Mason
The Clockwork Girl by Anna Mazzola
The Silent Brother by Simon Van der Velde

WINNER

Tell Me What I Am by Una Mannion

FINALISTS

Over My Dead Body by Maz Evans
The Secret Hours by Mick Herron
Small Mercies by Dennis Lehane
Black River by Nilanjana Roy
Vera Wong's Unsolicited Advice for Murderers by Jesse Sutanto

2010-2019

WINNER: Blacklands by Belinda Bauer

SHORTLIST:

Blood Harvest by S. J. Bolton
The Way Home by George Pelecanos
Shadowplay by Karen Campbell

Blood Harvest by S. J. Bolton
Call Number: FIC BOLTO SJ BL (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780312600518
Publication Date: 2010-06-08
The Fletchers' beautiful new house is everything they dreamed it would be. Built between two churches in Heptonclough, a small village on the moors that time forgot, it ought to be paradise for this young family of five, but they barely have a chance to settle in before they find that they're anything but welcome. Someone seems to be trying to drive them away--at first with silly pranks but then with threats that become increasingly dangerous, especially to the oldest child, ten-year-old Tom Fletcher, who begins to believe that someone is always watching him. The adults in Tom's life are trying to help, including his parents; the vicar next door, younger and more dashing than you'd expect a vicar to be; and a therapist, Evi Oliver, who believes him more than she wants to. But there are other clues that something isn't quite right in Heptonclough, including the mysterious accidental deaths of three toddlers over the last ten years. It is not until Tom's siblings, two-year-old Milly and five-year-old Joe Fletcher, go missing in turn that the little village's evil secret turns the Fletchers' dreams into a nightmare.

WINNER: Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter by Tom Franklin

Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter by Tom Franklin
Call Number: Fiction F834c (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780060594664
Publication Date: 2010-10-05
In the 1970s, Larry Ott and Silas "32" Jones were boyhood pals in a small town in rural Mississippi. Their worlds were as different as night and day: Larry was the child of lower-middle-class white parents, and Silas, the son of a poor, black single mother. But then Larry took a girl to a drive-in movie and she was never seen or heard from again. He never confessed . . . and was never charged.

SHORTLIST:

The Lock Artist by Steve Hamilton
Snowdrops by A. D. Miller
The End of the Wasp Season by Denise Mina

The Lock Artist by Steve Hamilton
Call Number: Fiction H2218L (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780312380427
Publication Date: 2010-01-05
Marked by tragedy, traumatized at the age of eight, Michael, now eighteen, is no ordinary young man. Besides not uttering a single word in ten years, he discovers the one thing he can somehow do better than anyone else. Whether it's a locked door without a key, a padlock with no combination, or even an eight-hundred pound safe ... he can open them all. It's an unforgivable talent. A talent that will make young Michael a hot commodity with the wrong people and, whether he likes it or not, push him ever close to a life of crime. Until he finally sees his chance to escape, and with one desperate gamble risks everything to come back home to the only person he ever loved, and to unlock the secret that has kept him silent for so long.

WINNER: The Rage by Gene Kerrigan

SHORTLIST:

Vengeance in Mind by N. J. Cooper
The Flight by M. R. Hall
Bereft by Chris Womersley

WINNER: Dead Lions by Mick Herron

SHORTLIST:

Rubbernecker by Belinda Bauer
The Shining Girls by Lauren Beukes
Rage Against the Dying by Becky Masterman

The Shining Girls by Lauren Beukes
Call Number: FIC BEUKE LAU S (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780316216852
Publication Date: 2013-06-04
Harper Curtis is a killer who stepped out of the past. Kirby Mazrachi is the girl who was never meant to have a future. Kirby is the last shining girl, one of the bright young women, burning with potential, whose lives Harper is destined to snuff out after he stumbles on a House in Depression-era Chicago that opens on to other times. At the urging of the House, Harper inserts himself into the lives of these shining girls, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. He's the ultimate hunter, vanishing without a trace into another time after each murder -- until one of his victims survives. Determined to bring her would-be killer to justice, Kirby joins the Chicago Sun-Times to work with the reporter, Dan Velasquez, who covered her case. Soon Kirby finds herself closing in on an impossible truth . . .

Rage Against the Dying (Brigid Quinn #1) by Becky Masterman
Call Number: FIC MASTE BEC Q1 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780312622947
Publication Date: 2013-03-12
Keeping secrets, telling lies, they require the same skill. Both become a habit, almost an addiction, that's hard to break even with the people closest to you, out of the business. For example, they say never trust a woman who tells you her age; if she can't keep that secret, she can't keep yours. I'm fifty-nine." Brigid Quinn's experiences in hunting sexual predators for the FBI have left her with memories she wishes she didn't have and lethal skills she hopes never to need again. Having been pushed into early retirement by events she thinks she's put firmly behind her, Brigid keeps telling herself she is settling down nicely in Tucson with a wonderful new husband, Carlo, and their dogs. But the past intervenes when a man named Floyd Lynch confesses to the worst unsolved case of Brigid's career--the disappearance and presumed murder of her young protgee, Jessica. Floyd knows things about that terrible night that were never made public, and offers to lead the cops to Jessica's body in return for a plea bargain. It should finally be the end of a dark chapter in Brigid's life. Except...the new FBI agent on the case, Laura Coleman, thinks the confession is fake, and Brigid finds she cannot walk away from violence and retribution after all, no matter what the cost.

WINNER: This Dark Road to Mercy by Wiley Cash

SHORTLIST:

Keep Your Friends Close by Paula Daly
The First Rule of Survival by Paul Mendelson
How the Light Gets In by Louise Penny

How the Light Gets In (Chief Inspector Gamache #9) by Louise Penny
Call Number: Fiction P416g v.9 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780312655471
Publication Date: 2013-08-27
Christmas is approaching, and in Québec it's a time of dazzling snowfalls, bright lights, and gatherings with friends in front of blazing hearths. But shadows are falling on the usually festive season for Chief Inspector Armand Gamache. Most of his best agents have left the Homicide Department, his old friend and lieutenant Jean-Guy Beauvoir hasn't spoken to him in months, and hostile forces are lining up against him. When Gamache receives a message from Myrna Landers that a longtime friend has failed to arrive for Christmas in the village of Three Pines, he welcomes the chance to get away from the city. Mystified by Myrna's reluctance to reveal her friend's name, Gamache soon discovers the missing woman was once one of the most famous people not just in North America, but in the world, and now goes unrecognized by virtually everyone except the mad, brilliant poet Ruth Zardo.

WINNER: Life or Death by Michael Robotham

Life or Death by Michael Robotham
Call Number: Fiction R666L (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780316252058
Publication Date: 2015-03-10
Audie Palmer has spent ten years in a Texas prison after pleading guilty to a robbery in which four people died and seven million dollars went missing. During that time he has suffered repeated beatings, stabbings and threats by inmates and guards, all desperate to answer the same question: where's the money?
On the day before Audie is due to be released, he suddenly vanishes. Now everybody is searching for him - the police, FBI, gangsters and other powerful figures - but Audie isn't running to save his own life. Instead, he's trying to save someone else's.

SHORTLIST:

The Shut Eye by Belinda Bauer
The Rules of Wolfe by James Carlos Blake
The Silkworm by Robert Galbraith
Missing by Sam Hawken
Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King
Pleasantville by Attica Locke

The Silkworm (Cormoran Strike novel #2) by Robert Galbraith
Call Number: FIC GALBR ROB C2 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780316206877
Publication Date: 2014-06-19
When novelist Owen Quine goes missing, his wife calls in private detective Cormoran Strike. At first, Mrs. Quine just thinks her husband has gone off by himself for a few days -- as he has done before -- and she wants Strike to find him and bring him home. But as Strike investigates, he discovers that Quine's disappearance is no coincidence. The novelist has just completed a manuscript featuring poisonous pen-portraits of almost everyone he knows. If the novel were published, it would ruin lives -- meaning that almost everyone in his life would have motives to silence him. When Quine is found brutally murdered under bizarre circumstances, Strike must race against time to understand the motivation of a ruthless killer, a killer unlike any he has encountered before . . .
The Silkworm [E-Book] (Cormoran Strike novel #2) by Robert Galbraith
Call Number: FIC GALBR ROB C2 Ebook (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9780316366168
Publication Date: 2014
The Silkworm [Streaming Audiobook] (Cormoran Strike novel #2) by Robert Galbraith
Call Number: FIC GALBR ROB C2 Audiobk (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9781478929642
Publication Date: 2014

Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King
Call Number: On Order
ISBN: 9781476754451
Publication Date: 2014-06-03
In the frigid pre-dawn hours, in a distressed Midwestern city, hundreds of desperate unemployed folks are lined up for a spot at a job fair. Without warning, a lone driver plows through the crowd in a stolen Mercedes, running over the innocent, backing up, and charging again. Eight people are killed; fifteen are wounded. The killer escapes. In another part of town, months later, a retired cop named Bill Hodges is still haunted by the unsolved crime. When he gets a crazed letter from someone who self-identifies as the "perk" and threatens an even more diabolical attack, Hodges wakes up from his depressed and vacant retirement, hell-bent on preventing another tragedy. Brady Hartfield lives with his alcoholic mother in the house where he was born. He loved the feel of death under the wheels of the Mercedes, and he wants that rush again. Only Bill Hodges, with a couple of highly unlikely allies, can apprehend the killer before he strikes again. And they have no time to lose, because Brady's next mission, if it succeeds, will kill or maim thousands.
Mr. Mercedes [Streaming Audio] by Stephen King
Call Number: OverDrive Audiobook
ISBN: 9781442378865
Publication Date: 2014

WINNER: Dodgers by Bill Beverly

SHORTLIST:

Black Widow by Chris Brookmyre
Blood Salt Water by Denise Mina
Real Tigers by Mick Herron

Blood, Salt, Water (Alex Morrow novel #5) by Denise Mina
Call Number: FIC MINA DE M5
ISBN: 9780316380546
Publication Date: 2015-12-01
A wealthy businesswoman disappears from her Glasgow home without a trace, leaving her husband and children panicked but strangely resistant to questioning. Tracing the woman's cell phone, police detective Alex Morrow discovers a call made from an unlikely location. A sleepy seaside community, Helensburgh is the last place you'd go looking for violence. But Morrow's investigation uncovers disturbing clues and a dead body in a nearby lake. When a connection to someone close to her surfaces, the case gets more personal than she could have imagined.

WINNER: The Dry by Jane Harper

The Dry (Aaron Falk #1) by Jane Harper
Call Number: FIC HARPE JAN F1 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9781250105608
Publication Date: 2017-01-10
After getting a note demanding his presence, Federal Agent Aaron Falk arrives in his hometown for the first time in decades to attend the funeral of his best friend, Luke. Twenty years ago when Falk was accused of murder, Luke was his alibi. Falk and his father fled under a cloud of suspicion, saved from prosecution only because of Luke's steadfast claim that the boys had been together at the time of the crime. But now more than one person knows they didn't tell the truth back then, and Luke is dead. Amid the worst drought in a century, Falk and the local detective question what really happened to Luke. As Falk reluctantly investigates to see if there's more to Luke's death than there seems to be, long-buried mysteries resurface, as do the lies that have haunted them. And Falk will find that small towns have always hidden big secrets.

SHORTLIST:

The Beautiful Dead by Belinda Bauer
Dead Man's Blues by Ray Celestine
Spook Street by Mick Herron
The Girl in Green by Derek B. Miller
A Rising Man by Abir Mukherjee

The Girl in Green by Derek B. Miller
Call Number: FIC MILLE DER G (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780544706255
Publication Date: 2017-01-03
1991. Near Checkpoint Zulu, one hundred miles from the Kuwaiti border, Thomas Benton meets Arwood Hobbes. Benton is a British journalist who reports from war zones in part to avoid his lackluster marriage and a daughter he loves but cannot connect with; Arwood is a midwestern American private who might be an insufferable ignoramus, or might be a genuine lunatic with a death wish--it's hard to tell. Desert Storm is over, peace has been declared, but as they argue about whether it makes sense to cross the nearest border in search of an ice cream, they become embroiled in a horrific attack in which a young local girl in a green dress is killed as they are trying to protect her. The two men walk away into their respective lives. But something has cracked for them both. Twenty-two years later, in another place, in another war, they meet again and are offered an unlikely opportunity to redeem themselves when that same girl in green is found alive and in need of salvation. Or is she?

WINNER: The Liar by Steven Cavanagh

SHORTLIST

London Rules by Mick Herron
Since We Fell by Dennis Lehane
Bluebird, Bluebird by Attica Locke
A Necessary Evil by Abir Mukherjee
Resurrection Bay by Emma Viskic

Since We Fell by Dennis Lehane
Call Number: FIC LEHAN DEN SI (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780062129383
Publication Date: 2017-05-09
After Rachel Childs, a former journalist, suffers an on-air mental breakdown, she lives as a virtual shut-in. In all other respects, however, she enjoys an ideal life with an ideal husband. Until a chance encounter on a rainy afternoon causes that ideal life to fray. As does Rachel's marriage. As does Rachel herself. Sucked into a conspiracy thick with deception, violence, and possibly madness, Rachel must find the strength within herself to conquer unimaginable fears and mind-altering truths.
Since We Fell by Dennis Lehane
Call Number: FIC LEHAN DEN SI Ebook (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9780062129406
Publication Date: 2017-05-09

Bluebird, Bluebird by Attica Locke
Call Number: Fiction L814b (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780316363297
Publication Date: 2017-09-12
When it comes to law and order, East Texas plays by its own rules--a fact that Darren Mathews, a black Texas Ranger, knows all too well. Deeply ambivalent about growing up black in the lone star state, he was the first in his family to get as far away from Texas as he could. Until duty called him home. When his allegiance to his roots puts his job in jeopardy, he travels up Highway 59 to the small town of Lark, where two murders--a black lawyer from Chicago and a local white woman--have stirred up a hornet's nest of resentment. Darren must solve the crimes--and save himself in the process--before Lark's long-simmering racial fault lines erupt. A rural noir suffused with the unique music, color, and nuance of East Texas.

WINNER: The Puppet Show by M. W. Craven

SHORTLIST:

All the Hidden Truths by Claire Askew
What We Did by Christobel Kent
Unto Us a Son is Given by Donna Leon
American by Day by Derek B. Miller
A Station on the Path to Somewhere Better by Benjamin Wood

What We Did by Christobel Kent
Call Number: FIC KENT CHR WH (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780374288754
Publication Date: 2019-02-05
Bridget has a secret--one she keeps from everyone, even her husband. One that threatens to explode when her childhood music teacher, Carmichael, walks into her dress shop. With him is a young girl on the cusp of adulthood, fresh-faced and pretty. She reminds Bridget of herself at that age, naïve and vulnerable. Bridget wants him away--away from her, away from that girl. But Carmichael won't leave her alone, won't stop stalking her. And Bridget's not a little girl anymore. When he pushes her too far, she snaps. But what she thought was a decisive act only unravels more insidious threats--more than she could have ever imagined--and from which no one is safe, not even her family.

Unto Us a Son Is Given (Commissario Guido Brunetti mystery #28) by Donna Leon
Call Number: FIC LEON DON B28 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780802129116
Publication Date: 2019-03-05
Count Falier was urging his Venetian son-in-law to investigate, and preferably intervene in, the seemingly innocent plan of the Count's best friend, the elderly Gonzalo Rodríguez de Tejada, to adopt a much younger man as his son. Under Italian inheritance laws this man would then be heir to Gonzalo's entire fortune, a prospect Gonzalo's friends find appalling. For his part, Brunetti wonders why the old man, a close family friend, can't be allowed his pleasure in peace. And yet, what seems innocent on the Venetian surface can cause tsunamis beneath. Gonzalo unexpectedly, and literally, drops dead on the street, and one of his friends just arrived in Venice for the memorial service, is strangled in her hotel room--having earlier sent Gonzalo an email saying "We are the only ones who know you cannot do this," referring to the adoption. Now with an urgent case to solve, Brunetti reluctantly untangles the long-hidden mystery in Gonzalo's life that ultimately led to murder--a resolution that brings him way more pain than satisfaction.
Unto Us a Son Is Given [E-Book] (Commissario Guido Brunetti mystery #28) by Donna Leon
Call Number: FIC LEON DON B28 Ebook (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9780802146823
Publication Date: 2019-03-05

2000-2009

WINNER: Motherless Brooklyn by Jonathan Lethem

Motherless Brooklyn [E-Book] by Jonathan Lethem
Call Number: FIC LETHE JON MO Ebook (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9780307789129
Publication Date: 2011
Brooklyn's very own self-appointed Human Freakshow, Lionel Essrog is an orphan whose Tourettic impulses drive him to bark, count, and rip apart our language in startling and original ways. Together with three veterans of the St. Vincent's Home for Boys, he works for small-time mobster Frank Minna's limo service cum detective agency. Life without Frank Minna, the charismatic King of Brooklyn, would be unimaginable, so who cares if the tasks he sets them are, well, not exactly legal. But when Frank is fatally stabbed, one of Lionel's colleagues lands in jail, the other two vie for his position, and the victim's widow skips town. Lionel's world is suddenly topsy-turvy, and this outcast who has trouble even conversing attempts to untangle the threads of the case while trying to keep the words straight in his head.

SILVER DAGGER: Friends in High Places by Donna Leon

SHORTLIST:

Purple Cane Road by James Lee Burke
The Skull Mantra by Eliot Pattison
Lost by Lucy Wadham
Havana Bay by Martin Cruz Smith

Purple Cane Road (Dave Robicheaux #11) by James Lee Burke
Call Number: FIC BURKE JAML R11 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780385488440
Publication Date: 2000-08-01
Dave Robicheaux has spent his life confronting the age-old adage that the sins of the father pass on to the son. But what was his mother's legacy? Dead to him since his youth, Mae Guillory has been shuttered away in the deep recesses of Robicheaux's mind. He's lived with the fact that he would never really know what happened to the woman who left him to the devices of a whiskey-driven father. But deep down, Dave still feels the loss of his mother and knows that the infinite series of disappointments in her life could not have come to a good end. While helping out an old friend, Dave is stunned when a pimp looks at him sideways and asks if he is the son of Mae Guillory, the whore a bunch of cops murdered 30 years ago. Her body was dumped in the bayou bordering Purple Cane Road, and the cops who left her there are still on the job. Dave's search for his mother's killers leads him to the darker places in his past, and solving this case teaches him what it means to be his mother's son.

Havana Bay (Arkady Renko #4) by Martin Cruz Smith
Call Number: FIC SMITH MARC R4 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780679426622
Publication Date: 1999-05-11
When the corpse of a Russian is hauled from the oily waters of Havana Bay, Arkady Renko comes to Cuba to identify the body. Looking for the killer, he discovers a city of faded loneliness, unexpected danger, and bewildering contradictions. His investigation introduces him to a beautiful Cuban policewoman; to the rituals of Santeria; to an American fugitive and a group of ruthless mercenaries. In this place where all things Russian are despised, where Hemingway fished and the KGB flourished, where the hint of music is always in the air, Arkady finds a trail of deceit that reaches halfway around the world–and a reason to relish his own life again.

WINNER: Sidetracked by Henning Mankell

SILVER DAGGER: Forty Words for Sorrow by Giles Blunt

SHORTLIST:

Dancing with the Virgins by Stephen Booth
Baby Love by Denise Danks
Right as Rain by George Pelecanos
The Ice Harvest by Scott Phillips

WINNER: The Athenian Murders by José Carlos Somoza

SILVER DAGGER: The Final Country by James Crumley

SHORTLIST:

Scaredy Cat by Mark Billingham
Jolie Blon's Bounce by James Lee Burke
City of Bones by Michael Connelly
Acid Row by Minette Walters

Jolie Blon's Bounce (Dave Robicheaux #12) by James Lee Burke
Call Number: FIC BURKE JAML R12 (Adult fiction)
ISBN: 9780743204842
Publication Date: 2002-06-04
When a beautiful teenage girl is killed, the victim of a particularly savage rape, New Iberia, Louisiana, police detective Dave Robicheaux senses from the very start of the investigation that the most likely suspect, Tee Bobby Hulin, is not the actual killer. Though a drug addict and general ne'er-do-well, Hulin just doesn't fit the profile for this kind of brutal crime. But when another murder occurs -- this victim a drugged-out prostitute who happens to be the daughter of one of the local mafia bigwigs -- all clues once again point to Tee Bobby Hulin, and the cries for arrest become too loud to ignore. The dead girl's father, however, prefers to take matters in his own hands and sets out to find -- and punish -- the killer himself.
But before Robicheaux can solve these crimes and bring the killer or killers to justice, he is forced to battle his own inner demons, including a painkiller addiction, a habit that begins as the result of a brutal and humiliating beating he suffers at the hands of the mysterious and diabolical character known as Legion.

City of Bones by Michael Connelly
Call Number: Fiction C7523b v.8 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780316154055
Publication Date: 2002-04-16
On New Year's Day, a dog finds a bone in the Hollywood Hills--and unearths a murder committed more than twenty years earlier. It's a cold case, but for Detective Harry Bosch, it stirs up memories of his childhood as an orphan. He can't let it go. As the investigation takes Bosch deeper into the past, a beautiful rookie cop brings him alive in the present. No official warning can break them apart--or prepare Bosch for the explosions when the case takes a few hard turns. Suddenly all of L.A. is in an uproar, and Bosch, fighting to keep control, is driven to the brink of an unimaginable decision.
City of Bones [E-Book] by Michael Connelly
Call Number: OverDrive E-Book
ISBN: 9780316144537
Publication Date: 2002

WINNER: Fox Evil by Minette Walters

SILVER DAGGER: Half-Broken Things by Morag Joss

SHORTLIST:

The Winter Queen by Boris Akunin
The Company by Robert Littell
Almost Blue by Carlo Lucarelli
The Blind Man of Seville by Robert Wilson

The Company by Robert Littell
Call Number: FIC LITTE ROB CO (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9781585671977
Publication Date: 2002-04-22
Racing across a landscape spanning the legendary Berlin Base of the ’50s, the Soviet invasion of Hungary, the Bay of Pigs, Afghanistan, and the Gorbachev putsch, The Company tells the thrilling story of agents imprisoned in double lives, fighting an amoral, elusive, formidable enemy—and each other—in an internecine battle within the Company itself.

The Blind Man of Seville (Javier Falcón #1) by Robert Wilson
Call Number: FIC WILSO ROB BL (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780151008353
Publication Date: 2003-02-03
Called to a gruesome crime scene, Inspector Javier Falcón is shocked and sickened by what he finds there. Strewn like flower petals on the victim’s shirt are the man’s own eyelids, evidence of a heinous crime with no obvious motive. When the investigation leads Falcón to read his late father’s journals, he discovers a disturbing and sordid past. Meanwhile, more victims are falling. While he struggles to solve the case, he comes across a missing section of his father’s journal—and becomes the murderer’s next intended victim.

WINNER: Blacklist by Sara Paretsky

Blacklist (Vi. I. Warshawski #11) by Sara Paretsky
Call Number: FIC PARET SAR W11 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780399150852
Publication Date: 2003-09-29
As a favor to her most important client, V. I. agrees to check up on an empty mansion. But instead of a mysterious intruder she discovers a dead man in the ornamental pond—a reporter for an African-American publication whom the suburban cops are quick to dismiss as a suicide. When the man’s shattered family hires V. I. to investigate, she is sucked into a Gothic tale of sex, money, and power, leading her back to McCarthy-era blacklists and forward to some of the darker aspects of the Patriot Act. As V. I. finds herself penned in to a smaller and smaller space by an array of people trying to silence her, and before she can untangled the sordid truth, two more people will die—and V.I.’s own life will hang in the balance.

SILVER DAGGER: Flesh and Blood by John Harvey

SHORTLIST:

Tokyo by Mo Hayder
The Torment of Others by Val McDermid
Midnight Cab by James W. Nichol
The Lover by Laura Wilson

WINNER: Silence of the Grave by Arnaldur Indriðason

SILVER DAGGER: Deadly Web by Barbara Nadel

SHORTLIST:

Calling Out for You by Karin Fossum
In Matto's Realm by Friedrich Glauser
Skinny Dip by Carl Hiaasen
Seeking Whome He May Devou by Fred Vargas

Skinny Dip by Carl Hiassen
Call Number: FIC HIAAS CAR SK (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780375411083
Publication Date: 2004-07-13
Chaz Perrone might be the only marine scientist in the world who doesn’t know which way the Gulf Stream runs. He might also be the only one who went into biology just to make a killing, and now he’s found a way–doctoring water samples so that a ruthless agribusiness tycoon can continue illegally dumping fertilizer into the endangered Everglades. When Chaz suspects that his wife, Joey, has figured out his scam, he pushes her overboard from a cruise liner into the night-dark Atlantic. Unfortunately for Chaz, his wife doesn’t die in the fall. Clinging blindly to a bale of Jamaican pot, Joey Perrone is plucked from the ocean by former cop and current loner Mick Stranahan. Instead of rushing to the police and reporting her husband’s crime, Joey decides to stay dead and (with Mick’s help) screw with Chaz until he screws himself. As Joey haunts and taunts her homicidal husband, as Chaz’s cold-blooded cohorts in pollution grow uneasy about his ineptitude and increasingly erratic behavior, as Mick Stranahan discovers that six failed marriages and years of island solitude haven’t killed the reckless romantic in him, we’re taken on a hilarious, full-throttle, pure Hiaasen ride through the warped politics and mayhem of the human environment, and the human heart.

WINNER: Raven Black by Ann Cleeves

SHORTLIST:

The Chemistry of Death by Simon Beckett
Red Leaves by Thomas H. Cook
Safer Than Houses by Frances Fyfield
Wolves of Memory by Bill James
A Thousand Lies by Laura Wilson

WINNER: The Broken Stone by Peter Temple

SHORTLIST:

The Fields of Grief by Giles Blunt
Pegasus Descending by James Lee Burke
Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn
Brother Grimm by Craig Russell
Sovereign by C. J. Sansom

Pegasus Descending (Dave Robicheaux #15) by James Lee Burke
Call Number: FIC BURKE JAML R15 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780743277723
Publication Date: 2006-07-18
The twists begin when Trish Klein -- the only offspring of Robicheaux's Vietnam-era buddy -- starts passing marked hundred-dollar bills in local casinos. Is she a good kid gone bad? A victim's child seeking revenge? A promiscuous beauty seducing everyone good within her grasp? And how does her behavior relate to the apparent suicide of another "good" girl, an ace student named Yvonne Darbonne, who apparently participated in a college frat orgy before her death? Can Robicheaux make his peace with the demons that have haunted him since his friend's murder so many years ago? Can he figure out how a local mobster fits into all the schemes and deaths? Can Robicheaux's life be whole again when it has been shattered by so much tragedy?
Pegasus Descending [CD] by James Lee Burke; Will Patton (Narrated by); Johnny Heller (Narrated by)
Call Number: CD Fiction BU R15 (Adult CD Audioboooks)
ISBN: 9781428102910
Publication Date: 2006-07-25

Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn
Call Number: FIC FLYNN GIL SH (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 0307341542
Publication Date: 2006-09-26
WICKED above her hipbone, GIRL across her heart. Words are like a road map to reporter Camille Preakerâs troubled past. Fresh from a brief stay at a psych hospital, Camilleâs first assignment from the second-rate daily paper where she works brings her reluctantly back to her hometown to cover the murders of two preteen girls. NASTY on her kneecap, BABYDOLL on her leg. Since she left town eight years ago, Camille has hardly spoken to her neurotic, hypochondriac mother or to the half-sister she barely knows: a beautiful thirteen-year-old with an eerie grip on the town. Now, installed again in her familyâs Victorian mansion, Camille is haunted by the childhood tragedy she has spent her whole life trying to cut from her memory. HARMFUL on her wrist, WHORE on her ankle. As Camille works to uncover the truth about these violent crimes, she finds herself identifying with the young victimsâa bit too strongly. Clues keep leading to dead ends, forcing Camille to unravel the psychological puzzle of her own past to get at the story. Dogged by her own demons, Camille will have to confront what happened to her years before if she wants to survive this homecoming.
Sharp Objects [E-Book] by Gillian Flynn
Call Number: FIC FLYNN GIL SH Ebook (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9780307351487
Publication Date: 2006
Sharp Objects [Streaming Audiobook] by Gillian Flynn
Call Number: FIC FLYNN GIL SH Audiobk (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9780739346808
Publication Date: 2006

WINNER: Blood from Stone by Frances Fyfield

SHORTLIST:

The Tin Roof Blowdown by James Lee Burke
The Coroner's Lunch by Colin Cotterill
Night Work by Steve Hamilton
What the Dead Know by Laura Lippman
A Vengeful Longing by R. N. Morris

The Tin Roof Blowdown (Dave Robicheaux #16) by James Lee Burke
Call Number: FIC BURKE JAML R16 (Adult fiction)
ISBN: 9781416548485
Publication Date: 2007-07-17
In the waning days of summer, 2005, a storm with greater impact than the bomb that struck Hiroshima peels the face off southern Louisiana. This is the gruesome reality Iberia Parish Sheriff's Detective Dave Robicheaux discovers when he is deployed to New Orleans. As James Lee Burke's new novel, The Tin Roof Blowdown, begins, Hurricane Katrina has left the commercial district and residential neighborhoods awash with looters and predators of every stripe. The power grid of the city has been destroyed and New Orleans reduced to the level of a medieval society. There is no law, no order, no sanctuary for the infirm, the helpless, and the innocent. Bodies float in the streets and lie impaled on the branches of flooded trees. In the midst of an apocalyptical nightmare, Robicheaux must find two serial rapists, a morphine-addicted priest, and a vigilante who may be more dangerous than the criminals looting the city. In a singular style that defines the genre, James Lee Burke has created a hauntingly bleak picture of life in New Orleans after Katrina
The Tin Roof Blowdown [CD] by James Lee Burke; Will Patton (Read by)
Call Number: CD Fiction BU R16 (Adult CD Audiobooks)
ISBN: 9780743567510
Publication Date: 2007-07-17

The Coroner's Lunch [Kindle] (Dr. Siri Paiboun #1) by Colin Cotterill
Call Number: FIC COTTE COL P1 Kindle (Request at Circulation Desk)
ISBN: 9781569473764
Publication Date: 2004-12-01
The Communist Pathet Lao has taken over this former French colony. Most of the educated class has fled, but Dr. Siri Paiboun, a Paris-trained doctor whose late wife had been an ardent Communist, remains. And so this 72-year-old physician is appointed state coroner, despite the fact that he has no training or even supplies to use in performing his new task. What he does have is curiosity and integrity. At his age he is not about to let a bunch of ignorant bureaucrats dictate to him. One of his first cases involves three bodies recovered from a reservoir, but Dr. Siri establishes that the cause of death was not drowning. These men seem to have been electrocuted, perhaps tortured, and they also seem to be Vietnamese, which could have international repercussions. And then there is the inexplicable death of a Party bigwig's equally important wife. She collapsed and died at a banquet. But Dr. Siri doesn't think her death was from natural causes. In the course of his investigations, Dr. Siri must travel to his birthplace, a Hmong village he has not visited for more than 60 years, where he makes a profound discovery, not only about the motive for several murders, but about himself.

Night Work by Steve Hamilton
Call Number: FIC HAMIL STE NI (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780312353612
Publication Date: 2007-09-18
Joe Trumbull is not a man who scares easily. As a juvenile probation officer in Kingston, New York, he's half cop, half social worker to the most high-risk youth in the city. And when he's not pounding the streets, trying to keep his kids out of jail, he's pounding a heavy bag in the gym to stay in shape. But tonight Joe Trumbull is scared to death. It's been two years since his fiancée, Laurel, was brutally murdered. Two years of grief and loneliness. On this hot summer night, he's finally going out on a blind date, his first date since Laurel's death. He's not looking for love, just testing the waters to see if it's possible to live a normal life again. The thought of it is turning his knees to jelly. Marlene Frost is a beautiful woman. She's warm and funny, with a smile to match. After the first awkward minutes, Joe finally starts to think this isn't such a bad idea after all. In fact, maybe this blind date will turn out to be one of the best things that ever happened to him. He couldn't be more wrong. Because somehow, for reasons Joe can barely understand, this one evening will mark the beginning of a new nightmare. A nightmare that will lead him to the faceless man in the shadows, and to the most terrible realization of all.… For Joe Trumbull, the past is never past. And the worst is yet to come.

What the Dead Know by Laura Lippman
ISBN: 9780061128851
Publication Date: 2007-03-13
Thirty years ago two sisters disappeared from a shopping mall. Their bodies were never found and those familiar with the case have always been tortured by these questions: How do you kidnap two girls? Who—or what—could have lured the two sisters away from a busy mall on a Saturday afternoon without leaving behind a single clue or witness? Now a clearly disoriented woman involved in a rush-hour hit-and-run claims to be the younger of the long-gone Bethany sisters. But her involuntary admission and subsequent attempt to stonewall investigators only deepens the mystery. Where has she been? Why has she waited so long to come forward? Could her abductor truly be a beloved Baltimore cop? There isn't a shred of evidence to support her story, and every lead she gives the police seems to be another dead end—a dying, incoherent man, a razed house, a missing grave, and a family that disintegrated long ago, torn apart not only by the crime but by the fissures the tragedy revealed in what appeared to be the perfect household. In a story that moves back and forth across the decades, there is only one person who dares to be skeptical of a woman who wants to claim the identity of one Bethany sister without revealing the fate of the other. Will he be able to discover the truth?

WINNER: A Whispered Name by William Brodrick

SHORTLIST:

When Will There Be Good News? by Kate Atkinson
In the Dark by Mark Billingham
Hit and Run by Lawrence Block
The Coroner by M. R. Hall
Dark Times in the City by Gene Kerrigan

When Will There Be Good News? (Jackson Brodie #3) by Kate Atkinson
Call Number: FIC ATKIN KAT B3 Kindle (Request at Circulation Desk)
ISBN: 9780316154857
Publication Date: 2008-09-24
On a hot summer day, Joanna Mason's family slowly wanders home along a country lane. A moment later, Joanna's life is changed forever... On a dark night thirty years later, ex-detective Jackson Brodie finds himself on a train that is both crowded and late. Lost in his thoughts, he suddenly hears a shocking sound... t the end of a long day, 16-year-old Reggie is looking forward to watching a little TV. Then a terrifying noise shatters her peaceful evening. Luckily, Reggie makes it a point to be prepared for an emergency...

Hit and Run (John Keller #4) by Lawrence Block
Call Number: FIC BLOCK LAW K4 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780060840907
Publication Date: 2008-06-24
For years now Keller's had places to go and people to kill. But enough is enough. Just one more job—paid in advance—and he's going to retire. Waiting in Des Moines for the client's go-ahead, Keller's picking out stamps for his collection at a shop in Urbandale when somebody guns down the charismatic governor of Ohio. Back at his motel, Keller sees the killer's face broadcast on TV. A face he's seen quite often. Every morning. In the mirror. Keller calls his associate Dot in White Plains, but there's no answer. He's stranded halfway across the country, and every cop in America has just seen his picture. His ID and credit cards are no longer good, and he just spent almost all of his cash on the stamps. Now what?

1990-1999

WINNER: Bones and Silence by Reginald Hill

Bones and Silence by Reginald Hill
Call Number: Fiction H5473b (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780385301305
Publication Date: 1990-07-01
What appears to be a simple murder case becomes more complicated as Pascoe and Dalziel peel away layer after layer of untruth.

SILVER DAGGER: The Late Candidate by Mike Phillips

SHORTLIST:

Rough Treatment by John Harvey

WINNER: King Solomon's Carpet by Barbara Vine

SILVER DAGGER: Deep Sleep by Frances Fyfield

SHORTLIST:

Death of a Partner by Janet Neel
Dirty Tricks by Michael Dibdin

WINNER: The Way Through the Woods by Colin Dexter

The Way Through the Woods (Inspector Morse #10) by Colin Dexter
Call Number: FIC DEXTE CO M10 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780517594445
Publication Date: 1993-03-16
Morse is enjoying a rare if unsatisfying holiday in Dorset when the first letter appears in THE TIMES. A year before, a stunning Swedish student disappeared from Oxfordshire, leaving behind a rucksack with her identification. As the lady was dishy, young, and traveling alone, the Thames Valley Police suspected foul play. But without a body, and with precious few clues, the investigation ground to a halt. Now it seems that someone who can hold back no longer is composing clue-laden poetry that begins an enthusiastic correspondence among England's news-reading public. Not one to be left behind, Morse writes a letter of his own--and follows a twisting path through the Wytham Woods that leads to a most shocking murder.

SILVER DAGGER: Bucket Nut by Liza Cody

WINNER: Cruel and Unusual by Patricia Cornwell

SILVER DAGGER: Fatlands by Sarah Dunant

SHORTLIST:

The Hand of Strange Children by Robert Richardson
Death Among the Dons by Janet Neel

WINNER: The Scold's Bridle by Minette Walters

SILVER DAGGER: ***Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow (aka Smilla's Sense of Snow)*** by Peter Høeg

Smilla's Sense of Snow by Peter Hoeg; Tiina Nunnally (Translator)
Call Number: Fiction H693s (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780374266448
Publication Date: 1993-09-01
She thinks more highly of snow and ice than she does of love. She lives in a world of numbers, science and memories--a dark, exotic stranger in a strange land. And now Smilla Jaspersen is convinced she has uncovered a shattering crime... It happened in the Copenhagen snow. A six-year-old boy, a Greenlander like Smilla, fell to his death from the top of his apartment building. While the boy's body is still warm, the police pronounce his death an accident. But Smilla knows her young neighbor didn't fall from the roof on his own. Soon she is following a path of clues as clear to her as footsteps in the snow.

SHORTLIST:

Crack Down by Val McDermid
Tunnel Vision by Sara Paretsky

Tunnel Vision (V. I. Warshawski #8) by Sara Paretsky
Call Number: FIC PARET SAR W8 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780385299329
Publication Date: 1994-05-01
Stubbornness has landed private eye V.I. Warshawski in big trouble at her Chicago office. With her grand old Loop building set to be razed, she's become a hold-out tenant amid frayed wiring and scary, empty corridors. Then she finds a homeless woman with three kids in the basement, and before she can rescue them, they disappear. Worst of all, she's been implicated in a murder--after the body of Deirdre Messenger, a prominent lawyer's wife, turns up sprawled across her desk.

WINNER: The Mermaids Singing by Val McDermid

SILVER DAGGER: The Summons by Peter Lovesey

SHORTLIST:

"Death in the Garden" by Elizabeth Ironside
The Dark Room by Minette Walters

The Dark Room by Minette Walters
Call Number: FIC WALTE MIN D (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780399140785
Publication Date: 1996-03-05
n this acclaimed psychological mystery, Jinx Kingsley, a prominent photographer and millionaire’s daughter, wakes up in an exclusive hospital suffering from amnesia. Not only can she not remember the car accident that caused her memory loss, but she doesn’t remember that her impending wedding has been called off or that her former fiancé and his girlfriend have been brutally murdered in the same way her first husband had been ten years before. Now she must try to piece together her memories in order to determine her innocence.

WINNER: Popcorn by Ben Elton

SILVER DAGGER: Bloodhounds by Peter Lovesey

SHORTLIST:

A Private Enquiry by Jessica Mann

WINNER: Black and Blue by Ian Rankin

Black and Blue [Kindle] (Inspector Rebus #8) by Ian Rankin
Call Number: FIC RANKI IAN R8 Kindle (Request at Circulation Desk)
ISBN: 9780312167837
Publication Date: 1997-10-15
Bible John killed three women, and took three souvenirs. Johnny Bible killed to steal his namesake's glory. Oilman Allan Mitchelson died for his principles. And convict Lenny Spaven died just to prove a point. "Bible John" terrorized Glasgow in the sixties and seventies, murdering three women he met in a local ballroom--and he was never caught. Now a copycat is at work. Nicknamed "Bible Johnny" by the media, he is a new menace with violent ambitions. The Bible Johnny case would be perfect for Inspector John Rebus, but after a run-in with a crooked senior officer, he's been shunted aside to one of Edinburgh's toughest suburbs, where he investigates the murder of an off-duty oilman. His investigation takes him north to the oil rigs of Aberdeen, where he meets the Bible Johnny media circus head-on. Suddenly caught in the glare of the television cameras and in the middle of more than one investigation, Rebus must proceed with caution: One mistake could mean an unpleasant and not particularly speedy death, or, worse still, losing his job.

SILVER DAGGER: Three to Get Deadly by Janet Evanovich

Three to Get Deadly (Stephanie Plum #3) by Janet Evanovich
Call Number: FIC EVANO JAN P3 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780684822655
Publication Date: 1997-02-14
Stephanie Plum, the brassy babe in the powder blue Buick is back and she's having a bad hair day -- for the whole month of January. She's been given the unpopular task of finding Mo Bedemier, Trenton's most beloved citizen, arrested for carrying concealed, gone no-show for his court appearance. And to make matters worse, she's got Lula, a former hooker turned file clerk -- now a wannabe bounty hunter -- at her side, sticking like glue. Lula's big and blonde and black and itching to get the chance to lock up a crook in the trunk of her car. Morelli, the New Jersey vice cop with the slow-burning smile that undermines a girl's strongest resolve is being polite. So what does this mean? Has he found a new love? Or is he manipulating Steph, using her in his police investigation, counting on her unmanageable curiosity and competitive Jersey attitude? Once again, the entire One for the Money crew is in action, including Ranger and Grandma Mazur, searching for Mo, tripping down a trail littered with dead drug dealers, leading Stephanie to suspect Mo has traded his ice-cream scoop for a vigilante gun. Cursed with a disastrous new hair color and an increasing sense that it's really time to get a new job, Stephanie spirals and tumbles through Three to Get Deadly with all the wisecracks and pace her fans have come to expect.
Three to Get Deadly [CD] (Stephanie Plum #3) by Janet Evanovich; Lori Petty (Read by)
Call Number: CD Fictin EV S3 (Adult CD Audiobooks)
ISBN: 9780743552110
Publication Date: 2006-05-01
Three to Get Deadly [E-Book] (Stephanie Plum #3) by Janet Evanovich
Call Number: FIC EVANO JAN P3 Ebook (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9780684868608
Publication Date: 1999-07-15
Three to Get Deadly [Streaming Audiobook] (Stephanie Plum #3) by Janet Evanovich
Call Number: FIC EVANO JAN P3 Audiobk (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9780743588263
Publication Date: 2004

SHORTLIST:

The Reluctant Investigator by Frank Lean

WINNER: Sunset Limited by James Lee Burke

SILVER DAGGER: Manchester Slingback by Nicholas Blincoe

SHORTLIST:

A Long Finish by Michael Dibdin
Fire Hawk by Geoffrey Archer
On Beulah Height by Reginald Hill
King Suckerman by George Pelecanos

WINNER: A Small Death in Lisbon by Robert Wilson

SILVER DAGGER: Vienna Blood by Adrian Mathews

SHORTLIST:

A Place of Execution by Val McDermid
Dead Souls by Ian Rankin
Angels Flight by Michael Connelly
Phreak by Denise Danks
Staring at the Light by Frances Fyfield

A Place of Execution by McDermid, Val
Call Number: FIC MDERM VAL PL (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780312644536
Publication Date: 2009-10-27
On a freezing day in December 1963, Alison Carter vanishes from her rural village, an insular community that distrusts the outside world. For the young George Bennett, a newly promoted inspector, it is the beginning of his most difficult and harrowing case--a suspected murder with no body, an investigation with more dead ends and closed faces than he'd have found in the anonymity of the inner city, and an outcome that reverberates through the years. Decades later Bennett finally tells his story to journalist Catherine Heathcote, but just when the book is poised for publication, he unaccountably tries to pull the plug. He has new information that he refuses to divulge, new information which threatens the very foundations of his existence. Catherine is forced to reinvestigate the past, with results that turn the world upside down.

Angels Flight (Harry Bosch #6) by Michael Connelly
Call Number: FIC CONNE MIC B6 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780316152198
Publication Date: 1999-01-01
An activist attorney is killed in a cute little L.A. trolley called Angels Flight, far from Harry Bosch's Hollywood turf. But the case is so explosive -- and the dead man's enemies inside the L.A.P.D. are so numerous -- that it falls to Harry to solve it. Now the streets are superheating. Harry's year-old Vegas marriage is unraveling. And the hunt for a killer is leading Harry to another high-profile L.A. murder case, one where every cop had a motive. The question is, did any have the guts?
Angels Flight [CD] (Harry Bosch #6) by Michael Connelly; Peter Giles (Read by)
Call Number: CD Fiction CO B6 (Adult CD Audiobooks)
ISBN: 9781619699823
Publication Date: 2013-06-11
Angels Flight [E-Book] (Harry Bosch #6) by MIchael Connelly
Call Number: FIC CONNE MIC B6 Ebook (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9780316135863
Publication Date: 2001
Angels Flight [Streaming Audiobook] (Harry Bosch #6) by Michael Connelly
Call Number: FIC CONNE MIC B6 Audiobk (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9781478925675
Publication Date: 2013

1980-1989

WINNER: The Murder of the Maharaja by H. R. F. Keating

SILVER DAGGER: Monk's Hood by Ellis Peters

Monk's-hood by Ellis Peters
Call Number: FIC PETER ELL C3 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780688004521
Publication Date: 1980
Gervase Bonel is a guest of Shrewsbury Abbey of Saint Peter and Saint Paul when he suddenly takes ill. Luckily, the abbey boasts the services of the clever and kindly Brother Cadfael, a skilled herbalist. Cadfael hurries to the man’s bedside, only to be confronted with two surprises: In Master Bonel’s wife, the good monk recognizes Richildis, whom he loved before he took his vows—and Master Bonel has been fatally poisoned by monk’s-hood oil from Cadfael’s stores. The sheriff is convinced that the murderer is Richildis’s son, Edwin, who hated his stepfather. But Cadfael, guided in part by his concern for a woman to whom he was once betrothed, is certain of her son’s innocence. Using his knowledge of both herbs and the human heart, Cadfael deciphers a deadly recipe for murder.

WINNER: Gorky Park by Martin Cruz Smith

Gorky Park [Kindle] (Arkady Renko #1) by Martin Cruz Smith
Call Number: FIC SMITH MARC R1 (Request at the Circulation Desk)
ISBN: 9780812977240
Publication Date: 2007-03-13
A triple murder in Moscow’s famous Gorky Park amusement centre rocks the capital - three corpses found in the snow, so badly mutilated that their identities can’t be verified. Chief Investigator Arkady Renko from the Moscow police takes the case. Renko is a brilliant investigator - dangerously so. Now, to identify the victims and uncover the truth, he must battle the KGB, FBI and the police - and stay alive doing it...

SILVER DAGGER: The Dead of Jericho by Colin Dexter

WINNER: The False Inspector Dew by Peter Lovesey

SILVER DAGGER: Ritual Murder by S. T. Haymon

WINNER: Accidental Crimes by John Hutton

SILVER DAGGER: The Papers of Tony Vietch by William McIlvanney

WINNER: The Twelfth Juror by B. M. Gill

SILVER DAGGER: The Tree of Hands by Ruth Rendell

The Tree of Hands by Ruth Rendell
Call Number: Fiction R397t (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780394530987
Publication Date: 1985-02-01
When Benet Archdale was a young girl in North London, her mother, Mopsa, made her nervous. The woman was unsound, and posed ever-present dangers. Yet Benet understood her sickness and forgave her threats. In pursuit of a relatively sane life as a novelist and loving single parent, Benet has since kept Mopsa at a distance. But it’s not only the sudden death of Benet’s two-year-old son that shakes her safe world. It’s the past. Mopsa has returned to be at her inconsolable daughter’s side. Nurturing, rational, and seemingly cured, Mopsa is going to do everything she can to ease Benet’s grief. Then, on the other side of town, the child of a barmaid has gone missing. Authorities fear the search can’t end well. As Benet and Mopsa are drawn into the disappearance, the secrets, lies, and desperation of three mothers will converge—by chance and by design. For them, it’s a crime that is at once a delusion, an escape, and a nightmare.

WINNER: Monkey Puzzle by Paula Gosling

SILVER DAGGER: Last Seen Alive by Dorothy Simpson

SHORTLIST:

Our Father's Lies by Andrew Taylor
A Piece of Justice by Jill Paton Walsh

WINNER: Live Flesh by Ruth Rendell

Live Flesh by Ruth Rendell
Call Number: Fiction R397L
ISBN: 9780394555447
Publication Date: 1986-08-12
In a remote corner of London, a woman is walking her dog when a man grabs her from behind. She screams, and her attacker flees, escaping into a nearby house, where he finds another victim. Victor Jenner has a compulsion he does not understand—to grab women, to hurt them—and he also has a gun. When it goes off, grievously wounding a police officer, it marks the beginning of a long stretch in jail for Victor. Released ten years later, Victor meets the young policeman he shot—and falls head over heels for the officer’s girlfriend. Back on the street, Victor is torn between the desire to live a better life and the knowledge that he will soon give in to his most evil yearnings.

SILVER DAGGER: A Taste for Death by P. D. James

A Taste for Death by P. D. James
Call Number: Fiction J28d v.7 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780394555836
Publication Date: 1986-10-12
Adam Dalgliesh and his two young assistants search for clues in the deaths of two men found in the vestry of a London church--one rich and elegant, the other an alcoholic tramp.

WINNER: A Fatal Inversion by Barbara Vine

SILVER DAGGER: Presumed Innocent by Scott Turow

Presumed Innocent by Scott Turow
Call Number: FIC TUROW SCO PR (Adult Fiction)
Publication Date: 1987
With three weeks to go in his boss' re-election campaign, a member of Rusty's staff is found murdered; he is charged with finding the killer, until his boss loses and, incredibly, Rusty finds himself accused of the murder.

SHORTLIST:

Under Contract by Liza Cody

WINNER: Ratking by Michael Dibdin

SILVER DAGGER: Toxic Shock by Sara Paretsky

WINNER: The Wench is Dead by Colin Dexter

SILVER DAGGER: The Shadow Run by Desmond Lowden

1970-1979

WINNER: Young Man I Think You're Dying by Joan Fleming

SILVER DAGGER: The Labyrinth Makers by Anthony Price

WINNER: The Steam Pig by James H. McClure

SILVER DAGGER: Shroud for a Nightingale by P. D. James

Shroud for a Nightingale (Adam Dalgliesh mysteries #4) by P. D. James
Call Number: FIC JAMES PD D4 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780743219600
Publication Date: 2001-09-11
The mysterious and tragic deaths of two student nurses send Adam Dalgliesh, Chief Superintendent of Scotland Yard, to hunt the vicious killer seeking refuge in the Nightingale House.

WINNER: The Levanter by Eric Ambler

SILVER DAGGER: The Rainbird Pattern by Victor Canning

WINNER: The Defection of A. J. Lewinter by Robert Littell

SILVER DAGGER: A Coffin for Pandora by Gwendoline Butler

WINNER: Other Paths to Glory by Anthony Price

SILVER DAGGER: The Grosvenor Square Goodbye by Francis Clifford

WINNER: The Seven-Per-Cent Solution by Nicholas Meyer

SILVER DAGGER: The Black Tower by P. D. James

The Black Tower [Large print] (Adam Dalgliesh mystery #5) by P. D. James
Call Number: FIC JAMES PD D5 Large (Large Print Collection)
Publication Date: 1975
Just recovered from a grave illness, Commander Adam Dalgliesh is called to the bedside of an elderly priest. When Dalgliesh arrives, Father Baddeley is dead. Is it merely his own brush with mortality that causes Dalgliesh to sense the shadow of death about to fall once more?

WINNER: A Demon in My View by Ruth Rendell

SILVER DAGGER: Rogue Eagle by James H. McClure

WINNER: The Honourable Schoolboy by John le Carré

The Honourable Schoolboy (George Smiley novel #6) by John le Carré
Call Number: FIC LECAR JOH S6 (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780340220429
Publication Date: 1977
The mole has been eliminated, but the damage wrought has brought the British Secret Service to its knees. Given the charge of the gravely compromised Circus, George Smiley embarks on a campaign to uncover what Moscow Centre most wants to hide. When the trail goes cold at a Hong Kong gold seam, Smiley dispatches Gerald Westerby to shake the money tree. A part-time operative with cover as a philandering journalist, Westerby insinuates himself into a war-torn world where allegiances—and lives—are bought and sold.

SILVER DAGGER: Laidlaw by Colin William McIlvanney

WINNER: The Chelsea Murders by Lionel Davidson

SILVER DAGGER: Waxwork by Peter Lovesey

WINNER: Whip Hand by Dick Francis

Whip Hand by Dick Francis
Call Number: Fiction F818w (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 9780060113841
Publication Date: 1979
Sid Halley, now a private investigator with a bionic hand, finds himself uncovering corruption in the racing world.

SILVER DAGGER: Service of All the Dead by Colin Dexter

1960-1969

WINNER: The Night of Wenceslas by Lionel Davidson

SHORTLIST:

My Brother Michael by Mary Stewart
Progress of a Crime by Julian Symons

WINNER: The Spoilt Kilt by Mary Kelly

SHORTLIST:

Call for the Dead by John le Carré
One Way by Allan Prior

WINNER: When I Grow Rich by Joan Fleming

SHORTLIST:

The Light of the Day by Eric Ambler
Hopjoy Was Here by Colin Watson

WINNER: The Spy Who Came in from the Cold by John le Carré

The Spy Who Came in From the Cold by John Le Carré
Call Number: Fiction L432sp (Adult Fiction)
Publication Date: 1964
A veteran spy wants to "come in from the cold" to retirement. He undertakes one last assignment in which he pretends defection and provides the enemy with sufficient evidence to label their leader a double agent.

SHORTLIST:

Gun Before Butter by Nicolas Freeling
The High Wire by William Haggard

WINNER: The Perfect Murder by H. R. F. Keating

SHORTLIST:

The Most Dangerous Game by Gavin Lyall
The Chill by Ross Macdonald

BEST FOREIGN:

The Two Faces of January by Patricia Highsmith

WINNER: The Far Side of the Dollar by Ross Macdonald

The Far Side of the Dollar [Kindle] by Ross Macdonald
Call Number: Kindle-0739
ISBN: 9780786155866
Publication Date: 2008-01-01
To reach the Barcelona Hotel you took Sunset and the coast highway. Once starlets and Navy boys had rubbed shoulders with tycoons and hustlers there, but for Lew Archer the old, closed-up palace held the key to a missing teenager and a hot murder. Archer knew that twenty years ago a handful of dreamers and losers had come together in the barcelona. The only question now was what kind of deal had gone down there, and why a mixed-up rich kid and a beautiful blonde were the first to pay the price ...

SHORTLIST:

For Kicks by Dick Francis
Accounting for Murder by Emma Lathen

For Kicks by Dick Francis
Call Number: FIC FRANC DIC FO (Adult Fiction)
ISBN: 0922890575
Publication Date: 1965
Australian horse breeder Daniel Roke had resisted the exorbitant sum of money offered by a suave Englishman to investigate a scandal involving drugged racehorses. But after another investigator dies mysteriously, Roke agrees to fill his shoes--and learns that men who would give drugs to horses are capable of doing much worse to human beings.

BEST BRITISH:

Midnight Plus One by Gavin Lyall

WINNER: A Long Way to Shiloh by Lionel Davidson

SHORTLIST:

The Double Agent by John Bingham

BEST FOREIGN:

In the Heat of the Night by John Ball

WINNER: Murder Against the Grain by Emma Lathen

SHORTLIST:

Lonely Heart 4122 by Colin Watson

BEST BRITISH

Dirty Story by Eric Ambler

WINNER: Skin Deep by Peter Dickinson

SHORTLIST:

The Private Wound by Nicholas Blake

BEST FOREIGN:

The Lady in the Car with Glasses and a Gun by Sébastein Japrisot

WINNER: A Pride of Heroes by Peter Dickinson

SILVER DAGGER: Another Way of Dying by Francis Clifford

SHORTLIST:

The Father Hunt by Rex Stout

The Father Hunt (Nero Wolfe series #43) by Rex Stout
Call Number: FIC STOUT REX W43 Ebook (OverDrive)
ISBN: 9780307755919
Publication Date: 2010
All pretty Amy Denovo wants to find the father she has never seen, but she can’t afford Nero Wolfe’s outlandish fees . . . or can she? Suddenly she’s knocking on the oversized detective’s door with a parcel full of bills in hand—and a quarter of a million hidden in her closet. It’s all part of a nest egg left by her unknown father. But when Wolfe and his able assistant, Archie Goodwin, begin to trace the money to the man, they make a startling discovery: Amy’s father murdered her mother—and now he may be after her.

1955-1959

WINNER: The Little Walls by Winston Graham

SHORTLIST:

Blind Date by Leigh Howard
Scales of Justice by Ngaio Marsh
The Man Who Didn't Fly by Margot Bennett

WINNER: The Second Man by Edward Grierson

SHORTLIST:

Time Right Deadly by Sarah Gainham
Man of Two Tribes by Arthur Upfield
Gideon's Week by J. J. Marric

WINNER: Colour of Murder by Julian Symons

SHORTLIST:

Off With His Head by Ngaio Marsh
Your Money or Your Life by George Milner
The Long Echo by Douglas Rutherford

WINNER: Someone from the Past by Margot Bennett

SHORTLIST:

Hide My Eyes by Margery Allingham
Or Be He Dead by James Byrom
Undiplomatic Exit by John Sherwood

WINNER: Passage of Arms by Eric Ambler

SHORTLIST:

A Way Back by James Mitchell
Strike for a Kingdom by Menna Gallie

Dagger Awards

Title Box

2020-2029

WINNER: Good Girl Bad Girl by Michael Robotham

Shortlist:

What You Pay For by Claire Askew

November Road by Lou Berney

Forced Confessions by John Fairfax

Jo Country by Mick Herron

Death in the East by Abir Mukherjee

WINNER

We Begin at the End by Chris Whitaker

Highly Commended

Blacktop Wasteland by S. A. Cosby

House of Correction by Nicci French

SHORTLIST

City of Ghosts by Ben Creed

Troubled Blood by Robert Galbraith

The Postscript Murders by Elly Griffiths

Midnight Atlanta by Thomas Mullen

WINNER

Sunset Swing by Ray Celestin

SHORT LIST:

Before you Knew My Name by Jacqueline Bublitz

Razorblade Tears by S. A. Cosby

The Unwilling by John Hart

The Shadows of Men by Abir Mukherjee

The Trawlerman by William Shaw

WINNER

The Kingdoms of Savannah by George Dawes Green

FINALISTS

The Lost Man of Bombay by Vaseem Khan

The Winter Guest by W.C. Ryan

A Killing in November by Simon Mason

The Clockwork Girl by Anna Mazzola

The Silent Brother by Simon Van der Velde

WINNER

Tell Me What I Am by Una Mannion

FINALISTS

Over My Dead Body by Maz Evans

The Secret Hours by Mick Herron

Small Mercies by Dennis Lehane

Black River by Nilanjana Roy

Vera Wong's Unsolicited Advice for Murderers by Jesse Sutanto

2010-2019

WINNER: Blacklands by Belinda Bauer

SHORTLIST:

Blood Harvest by S. J. Bolton

The Way Home by George Pelecanos

Shadowplay by Karen Campbell

WINNER: Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter by Tom Franklin

SHORTLIST:

The Lock Artist by Steve Hamilton

Snowdrops by A. D. Miller

The End of the Wasp Season by Denise Mina

WINNER: The Rage by Gene Kerrigan

SHORTLIST:

Vengeance in Mind by N. J. Cooper

The Flight by M. R. Hall

Bereft by Chris Womersley

WINNER: Dead Lions by Mick Herron

SHORTLIST:

Rubbernecker by Belinda Bauer

The Shining Girls by Lauren Beukes

Rage Against the Dying by Becky Masterman

WINNER: This Dark Road to Mercy by Wiley Cash

SHORTLIST:

Keep Your Friends Close by Paula Daly

The First Rule of Survival by Paul Mendelson

How the Light Gets In by Louise Penny

WINNER: Life or Death by Michael Robotham

SHORTLIST:

The Shut Eye by Belinda Bauer

The Rules of Wolfe by James Carlos Blake

The Silkworm by Robert Galbraith

Missing by Sam Hawken

Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King

Pleasantville by Attica Locke

WINNER: Dodgers by Bill Beverly

SHORTLIST: