LibGuides: Anthony Awards: 2020s

2020-2029

2020

The Murder List by Hank Phillippi Ryan

The Murder List by Ryan, Hank Phillippi
Call Number: FIC RYAN HANP M (Adult Fiction)

ISBN: 9781250197214

Publication Date: 2019-08-20

Law student Rachel North is the ultimate reliable narrator--she will tell you, without hesitation, what she knows to be true. She's smart, she's a hard worker, she does the right thing. She's successfully married to a faithful and devoted husband, a lion of Boston's defense bar. And her internship with the District Attorney's office is her ticket to a successful future. Problem is--she's wrong. Rachel. Jack. Martha. Who is next on The Murder List? And in this cat and mouse game--the battle for justice becomes a battle for survival.

FINALISTS:

Your House Will Pay by Steph Cha
They All Fall Down by Rachel Howzell Hall
Lady in the Lake by Laura Lippman
Miami Midnight by Alex Segura

One Night Gone by Tara Laskowski

One Night Gone [E-Book] by Tara Laskowski
Call Number: Fiction LASKO T ONG Ebook (OverDrive)

ISBN: 9781488053672

Publication Date: 2019-10-01

It was the perfect place to disappear... One sultry summer, Maureen Haddaway arrives in the wealthy town of Opal Beach to start her life anew—to achieve her destiny. There, she finds herself lured by the promise of friendship, love, starry skies, and wild parties. But Maureen’s new life just might be too good to be true, and before the summer is up, she vanishes. Decades later, when Allison Simpson is offered the opportunity to house-sit in Opal Beach during the off-season, it seems like the perfect chance to begin fresh after a messy divorce. But when she becomes drawn into the mysterious disappearance of a girl thirty years before, Allison realizes the gorgeous homes of Opal Beach hide dark secrets. And the truth of that long-ago summer is not even the most shocking part of all.

FINALISTS:

The Ninja Daughter by Tori Eldridge
Miracle Creek by Angie Kim
Three-Fifths by John Vercher
American Spy by Lauren Wilkinson

The Alchemist's Illusion by Gigi Pandian

The Alchemist's Illusion (Accidental alchemist #4) by Gigi Pandian
Call Number: FIC PANDI GIG A4 (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781938213120

Publication Date: 2020-10-16

Centuries-old alchemist Zoe Faust is tired of running from her past. She's finally got her life on track in Portland, Oregon, gardening and cooking in her fixer-upper house with her mischievous best friend, Dorian, the gargoyle chef. It seems like the perfect life for Zoe -- until she discovers that Nicolas Flamel is missing. A mystery from 16th century Prague may hold the key. Can Zoe find the art forger who holds the secret of what has become of her missing mentor?

Seven Ways to Get Rid of Harry by Jen Conley

Seven Ways to Get Rid of Harry by Jen Conley
Call Number: YA F CON-J (Young adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781948235938

Publication Date: 2019-06-03

The guy is a creep. Drinks too much, locks Danny out of the house, gets in Danny's face and calls him Danielle. Of course everyone blames Danny. It's his fault he gets into fights at school. It's his fault he can't control his anger. It's his fault Harry is such a jerk. Danny isn't such a bad kid--he has his own lawn business, makes his own dinner, even takes out the garbage and closes up the house without being asked. All he wants is for his mom to be like she used to be--a real mother who acted like one. Because Harry makes her stupid. When she gets around him, she forgets about her kids. Disappears with him, doesn't stick up for her own son. And the prospect of spending another day with this man makes Danny feel helpless and broken. So when Danny's sister, Lisa, reveals that Harry and their mom are getting married, Danny, never the one to cower, decides to do something. That's right, one way or another, he will get rid of Harry.

The Mutual Admiration Society: How Dorothy L. Sayers and her Oxford Circle Remade the World for Women by Mo Moulton

The Mutual Admiration Society : how Dorothy L. Sayers and her Oxford cicle remade the world for women by Mo Moulton
Call Number: 823.912 S274m (Adult Fiction)

ISBN: 9781541644472

Publication Date: 2019-11-05

Dorothy L. Sayers (1893-1957) was a renowned crime novelist who achieved fame and fortune during a period that historian Mo Moulton calls 'the day after the revolution.' In a time when just as many doors were closed to women as open, Sayers found professional success with her Lord Peter Wimsey novels. Yet she never could have done it without the cohort of remarkable women she met at university -- all of whom would go on to challenge societal norms and fight for equality of opportunity in their own way. In 1912, Dorothy L. Sayers and five friends founded a writing group at Somerville College, Oxford; they called themselves the 'Mutual Admiration Society.' Smart, bold, serious, and funny, these women were also sheltered and chaperoned, barred from receiving degrees despite taking classes and passing exams. Mutual Admiration Society follows these six women as they navigate the complexities of adulthood, work, intimacy, and sex in Interwar England. Bringing these women to vivid life, Moulton reveals how Dorothy L. Sayers was intimately intertwined with the members of the MAS -- and how, together, they fought their way into modernity

Malice Domestic 14: Mystery Most Edible edited by Verena Rose, Rita Owen, and Shawn Reilly

2021

Blacktop Wasteland by S. A. Cosby

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

FINALISTS:

What You Don't See by Tracy Clark
Little Secrets by Jennifer Hillier
And Now She's Gone by Rachel Howzell Hall
The First to Lie by Hank Phillipp Ryan

What You Don't See (Chicago mystery #3) by T. Clark
Call Number: FIC CLARK TRA C3 (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781496714930

Publication Date: 2020-05-26

Wealth. Power. Celebrity. Vonda Allen's glossy vanity magazine has taken the Windy City by storm, and she's well on her way to building a one-woman media empire. Everybody adores her. Except the people who work for her. And the person who's sending her flowers with death threats ... As Vonda's bodyguard, off-duty cop Ben Mickerson knows he could use some back-up--and no one fits the bill better than his ex-partner on the police force, Cass Raines. Now a full-time private eye, Cass is reluctant to take the job. She isn't keen on playing babysitter to a celebrity who's rumored to be a heartless diva. But as a favor to Ben, she signs on. But when Vonda refuses to say why someone might be after her, and two of her staff turn up dead, Ben and Cass must battle an unknown assailant bent on getting to the great lady herself, before someone else dies. Cass finds out the hard way just how persistent a threat they face during the first stop on Vonda's book tour. As fans clamour for her autograph, things take an ugly turn when a mysterious fan shows up with flowers and slashes Ben with a knife. While her ex-partner's life hangs in the balance, Cass is left to find out what secrets Vonda is keeping, who might want her dead, and how she can bring Ben's attacker to justice before enemies in the Chicago Police Department try to stop her in her tracks.
Little Secrets [E-Book] by Jennifer Hillier
Call Number: FIC HILLI JEN LI Ebook (OverDrive)

ISBN: 9781250154248

Publication Date: 2020-04-21

Marin had the perfect life. Married to her college sweetheart, she owns a chain of upscale hair salons, and Derek runs his own company. They're admired in their community and are a loving family—until their world falls apart the day their son Sebastian is taken. A year later, Marin is a shadow of herself. The FBI search has gone cold. The publicity has faded. She and her husband rarely speak. She hires a P.I. to pick up where the police left off, but instead of finding Sebastian, she learns that Derek is having an affair with a younger woman. This discovery sparks Marin back to life. She's lost her son; she's not about to lose her husband, too. Kenzie is an enemy with a face, which means this is a problem Marin can fix. Permanently.
And Now She's Gone by Rachel Howzell Hall
Call Number: FIC HALL RACH AN (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781250753175

Publication Date: 2020-09-22

Isabel Lincoln is gone. But is she missing? It's up to Grayson Sykes to find her. Although she is reluctant to track down a woman who may not want to be found, Gray's search for Isabel Lincoln becomes more complicated and dangerous with every new revelation about the woman's secrets and the truth she's hidden from her friends and family. Featuring two complicated women in a dangerous cat and mouse game, And Now She's Gone explores the nature of secrets-- and how violence and fear can lead you to abandon everything in order to survive.
The First to Lie by Ryan, Hank Phillippi
Call Number: FIC RYAN HANP F (Adult Fiction)

ISBN: 9781250258809

Publication Date: 2020-08-04

We all have our reasons for being who we are-but what if being someone else could get you what you want? After a devastating betrayal, a young woman sets off on an obsessive path to justice, no matter what dark family secrets are revealed. What she doesn't know-she isn't the only one plotting her revenge. An affluent daughter of privilege. A glamorous manipulative wannabe. A determined reporter, in too deep. A grieving widow who must choose her new reality. Who will be the first to lie? And when the stakes are life and death, do a few lies really matter? Bestselling and award-winning author and investigative reporter Hank Phillippi Ryan delivers another twisty, thrilling cat and mouse novel of suspense that will have you guessing, and second-guessing, and then gasping with surprise,

Winter Counts by David Heska Wanbli Weiden

Winter Counts [E-Book] : a novel by David Heska Wanbli Weiden
Call Number: FIC WEIDE DAVH WI Ebook (OverDrive)

ISBN: 9780062968968

Publication Date: 2020-08-25

Virgil Wounded Horse is the local enforcer on the Rosebud Indian Reservation in South Dakota. When justice is denied by the American legal system or the tribal council, Virgil is hired to deliver his own punishment, the kind that's hard to forget. But when heroin makes its way into the reservation and finds Virgil's nephew, his vigilantism suddenly becomes personal. He enlists the help of his ex-girlfriend and sets out to learn where the drugs are coming from, and how to make them stop. They follow a lead to Denver and find that drug cartels are rapidly expanding and forming new and terrifying alliances. And back on the reservation, a new tribal council initiative raises uncomfortable questions about money and power. As Virgil starts to link the pieces together, he must face his own demons and reclaim his Native identity. He realizes that being a Native American in the twenty-first century comes at an incredible cost.

FINALISTS:

Derailed by Mary Kellikoa
Murder in Old Bombay by Nev March
Murder at the Mena House by E. Neubauer
The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman

Derailed (Kelly Pruett #1) by Mary Keliikoa
Call Number: FIC KELII MAR P1 (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781603817066

Publication Date: 2020-05-12

PI Kelly Pruett is determined to make it on her own. And juggling clients at her late father's detective agency, a controlling ex, and caring for a deaf daughter was never going to be easy. She takes it as a good sign when a letter left by her dad ties into an unsolved case of a young woman struck by a train. Hunting down the one person who can prove the mysterious death was not just a drunken accident, Kelly discovers this witness is in no condition to talk. And the closer she gets to the truth, the longer her list of sleazy suspects with murderous motives grows. Each clue exposes another layer of the victim's steamy double life. Can Kelly pinpoint the murderer, or is she on the fast track to disaster?
Murder in Old Bombay by Nev March
Call Number: FIC MARCH NEV MU (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781250269546

Publication Date: 2020-11-10

In 19th century Bombay, Captain Jim Agnihotri channels his idol, Sherlock Holmes, in Nev March's Minotaur Books/Mystery Writers of America First Crime Novel Award-winning debut. In 1892, Bombay is the center of British India. Nearby, Captain Jim Agnihotri lays in Poona military hospital recovering from a skirmish on the wild northern frontier, with little to read but newspapers. The case that catches Jim's attention is being called the crime of the century: Two women fell from the busy university's clock tower in broad daylight. Moved by the widower of one of the victims - his certainty that his wife and sister did not commit suicide - Jim approaches the Framjis and is hired by the Parsee family to investigate what happened that terrible afternoon. But in a land of divided loyalties, asking questions is dangerous. Jim's investigation disturbs the shadows that seem to follow the Framji family and triggers an ominous chain of events.
Murder at the Mena House (Jane Wunderly #1) by Erica Ruth Neubauer
Call Number: FIC NEURA ERIR W1 (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781496725851

Publication Date: 2020-03-31

Egypt, 1926. American Jane Wunderly's Aunt Millie is meddling in the young widow's love life, but Jane is here to tour and see the Great Pyramids of Giza. At the Mena House other guests include Mr. Redvers, a roguish banker, and Anna Stainton, a socialite who won't share the spotlight with anyone. When Jane is found standing over her unintentional rival's dead body, who can be trusted, and who had motive to commit a brutal murder? She needs to excavate the truth before her future falls to ruin in Cairo.
The Thursday Murder Club [E-Book] (Thursday Murder Club #1) by Richard Osman
Call Number: FIC OSMAN RIC T1 Ebook (OverDrive)

ISBN: 9781984880970

Publication Date: 2020

In a peaceful retirement village, four unlikely friends meet weekly in the Jigsaw Room to discuss unsolved crimes; together they call themselves The Thursday Murder Club. When a local developer is found dead with a mysterious photograph left next to the body, the Thursday Murder Club suddenly find themselves in the middle of their first live case. As the bodies begin to pile up, can our unorthodox but brilliant gang catch the killer, before it's too late?.

Unspeakable Things by Jess Lourey

Unspeakable Things by Jess Lourey
Call Number: FIC LOURE JES UN (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781542008785

Publication Date: 2020-01-01

Cassie McDowell's life in 1980s Minnesota seems perfectly wholesome. She lives on a farm, loves school, and has a crush on the nicest boy in class. Yes, there are her parents' strange parties and their parade of deviant guests, but she's grown accustomed to them. All that changes when someone comes hunting in Lilydale. One by one, local boys go missing. One by one, they return changed--violent, moody, and withdrawn. What happened to them becomes the stuff of shocking rumors. The accusations of who's responsible grow just as wild, and dangerous town secrets start to surface. Then Cassie's own sister undergoes the dark change. If she is to survive, Cassie must find her way in an adult world where every sin is justified, and only the truth is unforgivable.

FINALISTS:

The Fate of a Flapper by Susanna Calkins
When No One is Watching by Alyssa Cole
The Lucky One by Lori Rader-Day

The Fate of a Flapper (Speakeasy murders #2) by Susanna Calkins
Call Number: FIC CALKI SUS S2 (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781250190857

Publication Date: 2020-07-28

A 1920s Chicago speakeasy... Gina Ricci takes on a job as a cigarette girl to earn money for her ailing father - and to prove to herself that she can hold her own at Chicago's most notorious speakeasy, the Third Door. She's enchanted by the harsh, glamorous world she discovers: the sleek socialites sipping bootlegged cocktails, the rowdy ex-servicemen playing poker in a curtained back room, the flirtatious jazz pianist and the brooding photographer-all overseen by the club's imposing owner, Signora Castallazzo. But the staff buzzes with whispers about Gina's predecessor, who died under mysterious circumstances, and the photographer, Marty, warns her to be careful. When Marty is brutally murdered, with Gina as the only witness, she's determined to track down his killer. What secrets did Marty capture on his camera - and who would do anything to destroy it? As Gina searches for answers, she's pulled deeper into the shadowy truths hiding behind the Third Door.
When No One Is Watching [E-Book] by Alyssa Cole
Call Number: FIC COLE ALY WH Ebook (OverDrive)

ISBN: 9780062982667

Publication Date: 2020-09-01

Rear Window meets Get Out in this gripping thriller from a critically acclaimed and New York Times Notable author, in which the gentrification of a Brooklyn neighborhood takes on a sinister new meaning.
The Lucky One by Lori Rader-Day
Call Number: FIC RADER LOR LU (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9780062938060

Publication Date: 2020-02-18

As a child, Alice was stolen from her backyard in a tiny Indiana community, but against the odds, her policeman father tracked her down within twenty-four hours and rescued her from harm. In the aftermath of the crime, her family decided to move to Chicago and close the door on that horrible day. Yet Alice hasn't forgotten. She devotes her spare time volunteering for a website called The Doe Pages scrolling through pages upon pages of unidentified people, searching for clues that could help reunite families with their missing loved ones. When a face appears on Alice's screen that she recognizes, she's stunned to realize it's the same man who kidnapped her decades ago. The post is deleted as quickly as it appeared, leaving Alice with more questions than answers. Embarking on a search for the truth, she enlists the help of friends from The Doe Pages to connect the dots and find her kidnapper before he hurts someone else. Then Alice crosses paths with Merrily Cruz, another woman who's been hunting for answers of her own. Together, they begin to unravel a dark, painful web of lies that will change what they thought they knew - and could cost them everything.

Holly Hernandez and the Death of Disco by Richie Narvaez

Holly Hernandez and the Death of Disco by Richie Narvaez
Call Number: YA F NAR-R (Young adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781558859029

Publication Date: 1920-05-31

In New York in 1979, high school sophomore Holly accuses her academic rival, Xander Herrera, of murder, but quickly realizes her mistake as they both set out to find the real killer.

FINALISTS:

Midnight at the Barclay Hotel by Fleur Bradley
Premeditated Myrtle by Elizabeth C. Bunce
From the Desk of Zoe Washington by Janae Marks
Star Wars Poe Dameron: Free Fall by Alex Segura

Midnight at the Barclay Hotel by Bradley, Fleur ; Xavier Bonet (Illustrator)
Call Number: Juv F BRA (Juvenile Fiction)

ISBN: 9780593202906

Publication Date: 2020-08-25

Five murder suspects are invited to the haunted Barclay Hotel for a weekend getaway, and it is up to twelve-year-old JJ and eleven-year-old Penny--and a lonely ghost--to figure out who committed the crime.
Premeditated Myrtle (Myrtle Hardcastle Mystery #1)) by Elizabeth C. Bunce
Call Number: Juv F BUN H1 (Juvenile fiction)

ISBN: 9781616209186

Publication Date: 2020-10-06

When twelve-year-old aspiring detective Myrtle Hardcastle learns her neighor in quiet Swinburne, England, a breeder of rare flowers, has died she is certain it was murder and that she must find the killer.
From the Desk of Zoe Washington by Marks, Janae
Call Number: JUV F MAR (Juvenile Fiction)

ISBN: 9780062875853

Publication Date: 2020-01-14

Avid baker Zoe Washington receives a letter on her twelfth birthday from her biological father, who is in prison for a terrible crime.
Free Fall (Star Wars Poe Dameron) by Alex Segura
Call Number: YA F SEG-A (Young adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781368051668

Publication Date: 2020-08-04

Unspeakable Acts: True Tales of Crime, Murder, Deceit, and Obsession by Sarah Weinman

Unspeakable Acts : true tales of crime, murder, deceit, and obsession by Sarah Weinman; Patrick Radden Keefe (Introduction by)
Call Number: 364.15 W424U (Adult nonfiction)

ISBN: 9780062839886

Publication Date: 2020-07-28

Sarah Weinman brings together an exemplary collection of thirteen recent true crime tales by some of the most exciting journalists and chroniclers of crime working today. With an introduction by Patrick Radden Keefe, this collection showcases true crime writing across the broadest possible spectrum and reflects on why crime stories are so transfixing and irresistible to the modern reader.

FINALISTS:

Sometimes You Have to Lie by Leslie Brody
American Sherlock by Kate Winkler Dawson
Howdunit! edited by Martin Edwards
The Third Rainbow Girl by Emma Copley Eisenberg
Phantom Lady by Christina Lane

Sometimes You Have to Lie : the life and times of Louise Fitzhugh, renegade author of Harriet the Spy by Leslie Brody
Call Number: BIO FITZH LOU B (Adult biography)

ISBN: 9781580057691

Publication Date: 2020-12-01

Louise Fitzhugh's books are full of resistance: to liars, to conformity, to authority, and even (radically, for a children's author) to make-believe. As a commercial children's author and lesbian, Fitzhugh often had to disguise the nature of her most intimate relationships. She lived her life as a dissenter--a friend to underdogs, outsiders, and artists--and her masterpiece remains long after her death to influence and provoke new generations of readers. Harriet is massively influential among girls and women in contemporary culture; she is the missing link between Jo March and Scout Finch, and it's not surprising that writers have thought of her as a kind of patron saint for misfit writers and unfeminine girls. This biography brings Harriet's creator into the frame, shedding new light on the author and her work.
American Sherlock : murder, forensics, and the birth of American CSI by Kate Winkler Dawson
Call Number: 363.25 D272a (Adult Nonfiction)

ISBN: 9780525539551

Publication Date: 2020-02-11

From the acclaimed author of Death in the Air ("Not since Devil in the White City has a book told such a harrowing tale"--Douglas Preston) comes the riveting story of the birth of criminal investigation in the twentieth century.
Howdunit: a Masterclass in Crime Writing by Members of the Detection Club by Martin Edwards (Editor)
Call Number: 808.3872 E26h (Adult nonfiction)

ISBN: 9780008380137

Publication Date: 2020-09-17

Howdunit offers a fresh perspective on the craft of crime writing from leading exponents of the genre, past and present. The book offers invaluable advice to people interested in writing crime fiction, but it also provides a fascinating picture of the way that the best crime writers have honed their skills over the years. Its unique construction and content mean that it will appeal not only to would-be writers but also to a very wide readership of crime fans. The principal contributors are current members of the legendary Detection Club, including Ian Rankin, Val McDermid, Peter James, Peter Robinson, Ann Cleeves, Andrew Taylor, Elly Griffiths, Sophie Hannah, Stella Duffy, Alexander McCall Smith, John Le Carré and many more. Interwoven with their contributions are shorter pieces by past Detection Club members ranging from G.K. Chesterton, Dorothy L. Sayers, Agatha Christie and John Dickson Carr to Desmond Bagley and H.R.F. Keating.
The Third Rainbow Girl : the long life of a double murder in Appalachia by Emma Copley Eisenberg
Call Number: 364.152 E36t (Adult nonfiction)

ISBN: 9780316449236

Publication Date: 2020-01-21

In the early evening of June 25, 1980, Vicki Durian, 26, and Nancy Santomero, 19, were killed in an isolated clearing in Pocahontas County, West Virginia. They were hitchhiking to a festival known as the Rainbow Gathering but never arrived. For thirteen years no one was prosecuted for the "Rainbow Murders," though suspicion was cast on a succession of local men. In 1993, a local farmer was convicted, only to be released when a known serial killer and diagnosed schizophrenic named Joseph Paul Franklin claimed responsibility. With the passage of time, as the truth seemed to slip away, the toll became more inescapable--the unsolved murders were a trauma, experienced on a community scale. Emma Copley Eisenberg spent five years re-investigating these brutal acts, which once captured the national media's imagination, only to fall into obscurity. A one-time New Yorker who took a job in Pocahontas County, Eisenberg shows how a mysterious act of violence against a pair of middle-class outsiders, has loomed over all those involved for generations, shaping their identities, fates, and the stories they tell about themselves. In The Third Rainbow Girl, Eisenberg follows the threads of this crime through the complex history of Appalachia, forming a searing portrait of America and its divisions of gender and class, and of its violence.
Phantom Lady : Hollywood Producer Joan Harrison, the Forgotten Woman Behind Hitchcock by Christina Lane
Call Number: BIO HARRI JOA L (Adult biography)

ISBN: 9781613733844

Publication Date: 2020-02-04

The untold story of Hollywood's most powerful female writer-producer of the 1940s, Joan Harrison, who grew from being the worst secretary Alfred Hitchcock ever had to one of his closest collaborators, critically shaping his brand as the "Master of Suspense."

Shattering Glass: a Nasty Woman Press Anthology edited by Heather Graham

Shattering Glass : a Nasty Woman Press anthology : fiction and nonfiction by bestselling authors by Heather Graham (Editor); Valerie Plame (Contribution by)
Call Number: ANT SHATT GLA G (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781734387926

Publication Date: 2020-06-16

Shattering Glass is the first in a series of remarkable anthologies published by a most unique publisher: Nasty Woman Press, a non-profit, 501(c)(4) founded to help fund other non-profits threatened by the rise of autocracy and the ongoing war against civil and human rights. A scintillating mixture of top-flight fiction from bestselling authors in multiple genres, fascinating articles and thought-provoking essays, conversations and interviews, Shattering Glass takes as its broad theme the empowerment of women.

2022

WINNER

Razorblade Tears by S. A. Cosby

Razorblade Tears by S. A. Cosby
Call Number: FIC COSBY SA RA (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781250252708

Publication Date: 2021-07-06

A Black father. A white father. Two murdered sons. A quest for vengeance. Ike Randolph has been out of jail for fifteen years, with not so much as a speeding ticket in all that time. But a Black man with cops at the door knows to be afraid. The last thing he expects to hear is that his son Isiah has been murdered, along with Isiah's white husband, Derek. Ike had never fully accepted his son but is devastated by his loss. Derek's father Buddy Lee was almost as ashamed of Derek for being gay as Derek was ashamed his father was a criminal. Buddy Lee still has contacts in the underworld, though, and he wants to know who killed his boy. Ike and Buddy Lee, two ex-cons with little else in common other than a criminal past and a love for their dead sons, band together in their desperate desire for revenge. In their quest to do better for their sons in death than they did in life, hardened men Ike and Buddy Lee will confront their own prejudices about their sons and each other, as they rain down vengeance upon those who hurt their boys.

NOMINEES

Runner by Tracy Clark
Clark and Division by Naomi Hirahara
The Collective by Alison Gaylin
These Toxic Things by Rachel Howzell Hall

Runner (Chicago mystery #4) by Tracy Clark
Call Number: FIC CLARK TRAP C4 (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781496732019

Publication Date: 2021-06-29

Chicago in the dead of winter. Fifteen-year-old Ramona Titus has run away from her foster home. Her biological mother, Leesa Evans, is a recovering addict who admits she failed Ramona often in the past. But now she is clean-- and determined to make up for her mistakes... if Cass can only help her find her daughter. Ramona's foster mother, Deloris Poole, is also desperate to bring the girl home. Ramona came to Deloris six months ago, angry and distrustful, but was slowly opening up. It seems Ramona doesn't want to be found... and Cass soon begins to understand why. Ramona is holding secrets dark enough to kill for, and anyone who helps her may be fair game.
Clark and Division by Naomi Hirahara
Call Number: FIC HIRAH NAO CL (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781641292498

Publication Date: 2021-08-03

Chicago, 1944: Twenty-year-old Aki Ito and her parents have just been released from Manzanar, where they have been detained by the US government since the aftermath of Pearl Harbor, together with thousands of other Japanese Americans. The life in California the Itos were forced to leave behind is gone; instead, they are being resettled two thousand miles away in Chicago, where Aki's older sister, Rose, was sent months earlier and moved to the new Japanese American neighborhood near Clark and Division streets. But on the eve of the Ito family's reunion, Rose is killed by a subway train. Aki, who worshipped her sister, is stunned. Officials are ruling Rose's death a suicide. Aki cannot believe her perfect, polished, and optimistic sister would end her life. Her instinct tells her there is much more to the story, and she knows she is the only person who could ever learn the truth. Inspired by historical events, Clark and Division infuses an atmospheric and heartbreakingly real crime fiction plot with rich period details and delicately wrought personal stories Naomi Hirahara has gleaned from thirty years of research and archival work in Japanese American history.

WINNER

Arsenic and Adobo by Mia P. Manansala

Arsenic and Adobo (Tita Rosie's kitchen mystery #1) by Mia P. Manansala
Call Number: FIC MANAN MIAP T1 (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9780593201671

Publication Date: 2021-05-04

When Lila Macapagal moves back home to recover from a horrible breakup, her life seems to be following all the typical rom-com tropes. She's tasked with saving her Tita Rosie's failing restaurant, and she has to deal with a group of matchmaking aunties who shower her with love and judgment. But when a notoriously nasty food critic (who happens to be her ex-boyfriend) drops dead moments after a confrontation with Lila, her life quickly swerves from a Nora Ephron romp to an Agatha Christie case. With the cops treating her like she's the one and only suspect, and the shady landlord looking to finally kick the Macapagal family out and resell the storefront, Lila's left with no choice but to conduct her own investigation. Armed with the nosy auntie network, her barista best bud, and her trusted Dachshund, Longanisa, Lila takes on this tasty, twisted case and soon finds her own neck on the chopping block.

NOMINEES:

The Other Black Girl
Walking Through Needles
Her Name is Knight
All Her Little Secrets

All Her Little Secrets by Wanda M. Morris
Call Number: FIC MORRI WANM AL

ISBN: 9780063082465

Publication Date: 2021-11-02

Ellice Littlejohn seemingly has it all: an Ivy League law degree, a well-paying job as a corporate attorney in midtown Atlanta, great friends, and a "for fun" relationship with a rich, charming executive, who just happens to be her white boss. But everything changes one cold January morning when Ellice arrives in the executive suite and finds him dead with a gunshot to his head. And then she walks away like nothing has happened. Why? Ellice has been keeping a cache of dark secrets, including a small-town past and a kid brother who's spent time on the other side of the law. She can't be thrust into the spotlight--again... When she uncovers shady dealings inside the company, Ellice is trapped in an impossible ethical and moral dilemma. Suddenly, Ellice's past and present lives collide as she launches into a pulse-pounding race to protect the brother she tried to save years ago and stop a conspiracy far more sinister than she could have ever imagined.

WINNER

Bloodline by Jess Lourey

Bloodline by Jess Lourey
Call Number: FIC LOURE JES BL

ISBN: 9781542016315

Publication Date: 2021-01-01

In a tale inspired by real events, pregnant journalist Joan Harken is cautiously excited to follow her fiance back to his Minnesota hometown. And yet, something is off in the picture-perfect village. The friendliness borders on intrusive. Joan can't shake the feeling that every move she makes is being tracked.

WINNER

I Play One on TV by Alan Orloff

I Play One on TV by Alan Orloff
Call Number: YA F ORL-A (Young adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781643962139

Publication Date: 2021-07-01

All’s great for sixteen-year-old actor Dalton Black as he portrays a teen killer on a crime reenactment show. That is, until he realizes someone is stalking him. When that someone turns out to be Homer Lee Varney, the man convicted of the murder, things take a dark turn, and Dalton is afraid for his life. What does Varney want? Some sort of twisted revenge? Or something even worse? Can Dalton and his drama friends discover the truth, before they become the killer’s next victims? Stay tuned to find out!

NOMINEES

Enola Holmes and the Black Barouche by Nancy Springer
Cold-Blooded Myrtle by Elizabeth C. Bunce
Bury Me in Shadows by Greg Herren
The Forest of Stolen Girls by June Hur

Enola Holmes and the Black Barouche by Nancy Springer
ISBN: 9781250822956

Publication Date: 2021-08-31

When professional typist Letitia Glover is desperate to learn more about the fate of her twin sister Flossie, Enola enlists the help of her brother Sherlock and her friend Tewky to investigate Flossie's husband, the sudden death of his first wife, and the mysterious appearance of a black barouche.
Cold-Blooded Myrtle (Myrtle Hardcastle mystery #3) by Elizabeth C. Bunce
Call Number: JUV F BUN H3 (Juvenile fiction)

ISBN: 9781616209209

Publication Date: 2021-10-05

Twelve-year-old Young Lady of Quality and Victorian amateur detective Myrtle Hardcastle returns, and now she is on the trail of a serial killer in her hometown of Swinburne.
The Forest of Stolen Girls by June Hur
Call Number: YA F HUR-J (Young adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781250229588

Publication Date: 2021-04-20

In 1426 in Joseon, a year after her father vanishes while investigating the disappearance of thirteen girls, eighteen-year-old Min Hwani returns to the island of Jeju to pick up his trail with the help of her estranged sister.

WINNER

How to Write a Mystery : a Handbook from Mystery Writers of America by Lee Child and Laurie R. King

How to Write a Mystery : a handbook from Mystery Writers of America by Mystery Writers of America; Lee Child (Editor); Laurie R. King (Editor)
Call Number: 808.3872 M998h (Adult nonfiction)

ISBN: 9781982149437

Publication Date: 2021-04-27

From some of the most successful mystery writers in the business, an invaluable guide to crafting mysteries, from character development and plot to procedurals and thrillers.

NOMINEES:

The Haunting of Alma Fielding
The Combat Zone : Murder, Race, and Boston's Struggle for Justice
Last Call : a True Story of Love, Lust, and Murder in Queer New York
Murder Book : a Graphic Memoir of a True Crime Obsession

The Haunting of Alma Fielding : a true ghost story by Kate Summerscale
Call Number: 133.1 S955h (Adult nonfiction)

ISBN: 9780525557920

Publication Date: 2021-04-27

London, 1938. In the suburbs of the city, a young housewife has become the eye in a storm of chaos. In Alma Fielding's modest home, china flies off the shelves and eggs fly through the air; stolen jewellery appears on her fingers, white mice crawl out of her handbag, beetles appear from under her gloves; in the middle of a car journey, a turtle materializes on her lap. The culprit is incorporeal. As Alma cannot call the police, she calls the papers instead. After the sensational story headlines the news, Nandor Fodor, a Hungarian ghost hunter for the International Institute for Psychical Research, arrives to investigate the poltergeist. But when he embarks on his scrupulous investigation, he discovers that the case is even stranger than it seems. By unravelling Alma's peculiar history, Fodor finds a different and darker type of haunting, a tale of trauma, alienation, loss and revenge. He comes to believe that Alma's past has bled into her present, her mind into her body. There are no words for processing her experience, so it comes to possess her. As the threat of a world war looms, and as Fodor's obsession with the case deepens, Alma becomes ever more disturbed. With characteristic rigor and insight, Kate Summerscale brilliantly captures the rich atmosphere of a haunting that transforms into a very modern battle between the supernatural and the subconscious.
The Combat Zone : murder, race, and Boston's struggle for justice by Jan Brogan
Call Number: 362.88 B866c (Adult nonfiction)

ISBN: 9781625346087

Publication Date: 2021-09-24

At the end of the 1976 football season, more than thirty Harvard athletes went to Boston's Combat Zone to celebrate. In the city's adult entertainment district, drugs and prostitution ran rampant, violent crime was commonplace, and corrupt police turned the other way. At the end of the night, Italian American star athlete Andy Puopolo, raised in the city's North End, was murdered in a stabbing. Three African American men were accused of the crime. His murder made national news and led to the eventual demise of the city's red-light district. Starting with this brutal murder, The Combat Zone tells the story of the Puopolo family's struggle with both a devastating loss and a criminal justice system that produced two trials with opposing verdicts, all within the context of a racially divided Boston. Brogan traces the contentious relationship between Boston's segregated neighborhoods during the busing crisis; shines a light on the overtly racist court system that allowed lawyers to strike potential jurors based on their ethnic identity; and lays bare the deep-seated corruption within the police department and throughout the Combat Zone. What emerges is a fascinating snapshot of the city at a transitional moment in its recent past.
Last Call : a true story of love, lust, and murder in queer New York by Elon Green
Call Number: 364.152 G795L (Adult nonfiction)

ISBN: 9781250224354

Publication Date: 2021-03-09

In this work of nonfiction, Elon Green reports on a series of baffling and brutal crimes. The victims of the serial murderer dubbed the 'Last Call Killer' were all gay men, and Green tries to shine a light onto their complicated lives and the queer community in New York City in the 1980s and 1990s as well. Peter Stickney Anderson was the first of the known victims.

WINNER

This Time for Sure : Bouchercon Anthology 2021

This Time for Sure : Boucheron anthology 2021 by Hank Phillippi Ryan (Editor)
Call Number: ANT BOUCH ANT 2021

ISBN: 9781643962115

Publication Date: 2021-08-01

What would you do if you had a second chance? A do-over? How far would you go to get back at the one who got away, the one who did you wrong, the one who tricked you, manipulated you, ignored you? The one who dumped you, cheated on you-or harmed a friend? What would you risk to have that one little chance to get back at them? Twenty-two brilliant skilled authors now offer their journeys into revenge. Retribution. Redemption. Revealed how they would even the score, turn the tables, make things right. One used a map. One a tape recorder. A decoy. A disguise. A lie. One even used a banana. And, fine. Because we are crime fiction authors, turns out there's a lot of murder involved. And because these are short stories-hang on for the ride. Twists, turns, surprises-and even some heartbreak. Because there's nothing as delicious and tempting as a second chance. Oh, we promise ourselves. This time for sure. With stories by Sharon Bader, Damyanti Biswas, Clark Boyd, Lucy Burdette, Karen Dionne, Elisabeth Elo, Elizabeth Elwood, Alexia Gordon, Heather Graham, G. Miki Hayden, Edwin Hill, Craig Johnson, Ellen Clair Lamb, Kristen Lepionka, Alan Orloff, Martha Reed, Alex Segura, Steve Shrott, Charles Todd, Gabriel Valjan, David Heska Wanbli Weiden, and Andrew Welsh-Huggins. 100% of net revenues received benefit the New Orleans Public Library.

NOMINEES:

When a Stranger Comes to Town
Under the Thumb : Stories of Police Oppression
Trouble No More : Crime Fiction Inspired by Southern Rock and the Blues
Midnight Hour : a Chilling Anthology of Crime Fiction from 20 Acclaimed Authors of Color

2023

WINNER

Like a Sister by Kellye Garrett

Like a Sister by Kellye Garrett
Call Number: FIC GARRE KEL LI

ISBN: 9780316256773

Publication Date: 2023-02-07

When the body of reality TV star Desiree Pierce is found on a playground in the Bronx the morning after her twenty-fifth birthday party, the police and the media are quick to declare her death an overdose. A tragedy, certainly, but not a crime. Yet Columbia grad student Lena--principled, headstrong, and allergic to the spotlight--knows that can't be the case. Despite the bitter truth that the two hadn't spoken in two years, they were half-sisters. Lena knew Desiree. And Desiree would never travel above 125th Street. Something is very wrong with the facts. So why is no one listening? While the two sisters had been torn apart by Desiree's partying and by their difficult father, Lena becomes determined to find justice for Desiree. Even if that means untangling her family's darkest secrets--or ending up dead herself.

NOMINEES

The Bullet That Missed by Richard Osman
The Maid by Nina Prose
Secret Identity by Alex Segura
The Devil Takes You Home by Gabino Iglesias
A World of Curiosities by Louise Penny

The Bullet That Missed (Thursday Murder Club #3) by Richard Osman
Call Number: FIC OSMAN RIC T3 (Adtult fiction)

ISBN: 9780593299395

Publication Date: 2022-09-20

It is an ordinary Thursday, and things should finally be returning to normal. Except trouble is never far away where the Thursday Murder Club are concerned. A decade-old cold case--their favorite kind--leads them to a local news legend and a murder with no body and no answers. Then a new foe pays Elizabeth a visit. Her mission? Kill or be killed. Suddenly the cold case has become red hot. While Elizabeth wrestles with her conscience (and a gun), Joyce, Ron, and Ibrahim chase down the clues with help from old friends and new. But can the gang solve the mystery and save Elizabeth before the murderer strikes again?
The Maid by Nita Prose
Call Number: FIC PROSE NIT M (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9780593356159

Publication Date: 2022-01-04

Molly Dunn is not like everyone else. She struggles with social skills and interprets people literally. Her gran used to interpret the world for her, codifying it into simple rules that Molly could live by. Since Gran died a few months ago, twenty-five-year-old Molly has had to navigate life's complexities all by herself. No matter--she throws herself with gusto into her work as a hotel maid. Her unique character, along with her obsessive love of cleaning and proper etiquette, make her an ideal fit for the job. She delights in donning her crisp uniform each morning, stocking her cart with miniature soaps and bottles, and returning guest rooms at the Regency Grand Hotel to a state of perfection. But Molly's orderly life is turned on its head the day she enters the suite of the infamous and wealthy Charles Black, only to find it in a state of disarray and Mr. Black himself very dead in his bed. Before she knows what's happening, Molly's odd demeanor has the police targeting her as their lead suspect and she finds herself in a web of subtext and nuance she has no idea how to untangle. Fortunately for Molly, a medley of friends she didn't realize she had refuses to let her be charged with murder--but will they be able to discover the real killer before it's too late?
Secret Identity by Alex Segura
Call Number: FIC SEGUR ALE SE (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781250801746

Publication Date: 2022-03-15

It's 1975 and the comic book industry is struggling, but Carmen Valdez doesn't care. She's an assistant at Triumph Comics, which doesn't have the creative zeal of Marvel nor the buttoned-up efficiency of DC, but it doesn't matter. Carmen is tantalizingly close to fulfilling her dream of writing a superhero book. That dream is nearly a reality when one of the Triumph writers enlists her help to create a new character, which they call "The Lethal Lynx," Triumph's first female hero. But her colleague is acting strangely and asking to keep her involvement a secret. And then he's found dead, with all of their scripts turned into the publisher without her name. Carmen is desperate to piece together what happened to him, to hang on to her piece of the Lynx, which turns out to be a runaway hit. But that's complicated by a surprise visitor from her home in Miami, a tenacious cop who is piecing everything together too quickly for Carmen, and the tangled web of secrets and resentments among the passionate eccentrics who write comics for a living.
The Devil Takes You Home by Gabino Iglesias
Call Number: FIC IGLES GAB DE

ISBN: 9780316426916

Publication Date: 2022-08-02

Buried in debt due to his young daughter's illness, and his marriage at the brink, Mario reluctantly takes a job as a hitman, surprising himself with his proclivity for violence. After tragedy destroys the life he knew, Mario agrees to one final job: hijack a cartel's cash shipment before it reaches Mexico. Along with an old friend and a cartel insider named Juanca, Mario sets off on a near-suicidal mission, which will leave him with either a cool $200,000 or a bullet in the skull. But the path to reward or ruin is never as straight as it seems. As the three complicated men travel through the endless landscape of Texas, across the border and back, their hidden motivations are laid bare alongside nightmarish encounters that defy explanation. One thing is certain: even if Mario makes it out alive, he won't return the same.
A World of Curiosities (Chief Inspector Gamache #18) by Louise Penny
Call Number: FIC PENNY LOU G18 (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781250145291

Publication Date: 2022-11-29

It's spring and Three Pines is reemerging after the harsh winter. But not everything buried should come alive again. Not everything lying dormant should reemerge. But something has. As the villagers prepare for a special celebration, Armand Gamache and Jean-Guy Beauvoir find themselves increasingly worried. A young man and woman have reappeared in the Sûreté du Québec investigators' lives after many years. The two were young children when their troubled mother was murdered, leaving them damaged, shattered. Now they've arrived in the village of Three Pines. But to what end? Gamache and Beauvoir's memories of that tragic case, the one that first brought them together, come rushing back. Did their mother's murder hurt them beyond repair? Have those terrible wounds, buried for decades, festered and are now about to erupt? As Chief Inspector Gamache works to uncover answers, his alarm grows when a letter written by a long dead stone mason is discovered. In it the man describes his terror when bricking up an attic room somewhere in the village. Every word of the 150-year-old letter is filled with dread. When the room is found, the villagers decide to open it up. As the bricks are removed, Gamache, Beauvoir and the villagers discover a world of curiosities. But the head of homicide soon realizes there's more in that room than meets the eye. There are puzzles within puzzles, and hidden messages warning of mayhem and revenge. In unsealing that room, an old enemy is released into their world. Into their lives. And into the very heart of Armand Gamache's home.

WINNER

Anywhere You Run by Wanda M. Morris

Anywhere You Run by Wanda M. Morris
Call Number: FIC MORRI WANM AN

ISBN: 9780063271821

Publication Date: 2022-10-25

Two sisters on the run from Jim Crow justice in 1964 Jackson, Mississippi, flee to separate parts of the country, unaware that they are both being pursued by someone with dark secrets and a disturbing motive for finding them that is unknown to anyone but himself.

NOMINEES:

Danger on the Atlantic by Erica Ruth Neubauer
In Place of Fear by Catriona McPherson
Lavender House by Lev A. C. Rosen
Under a Veiled Moon by Karen Odden
The Lindbergh Nanny by Mariah Fredericks

In Place of Fear by Catriona McPherson
Call Number: FIC MPHER CAT IN

ISBN: 9781529337969

Publication Date: 2022-06-28

A newly appointed Medical Welfare Almoner in 1940s Edinburgh at the inception of the National Health Service stumbles into something suspicious and dark within the medical community after a young woman mysteriously disappears.
The Lindbergh Nanny by Mariah Fredericks
Call Number: FIC FREDE MAR LI

ISBN: 9781250827401

Publication Date: 2022-11-15

When the most famous toddler in America, Charles Lindbergh, Jr., is kidnapped from his family home in New Jersey in 1932, the case makes international headlines. Already celebrated for his flight across the Atlantic, his father, Charles, Sr., is the country's golden boy, with his wealthy, lovely wife, Anne Morrow Lindbergh, by his side. But there's someone else in their household - Betty Gow, a formerly obscure young woman, now known around the world by another name: the Lindbergh Nanny. A Scottish immigrant deciphering the rules of her new homeland and its East Coast elite, Betty finds Colonel Lindbergh eccentric and often odd, Mrs. Lindbergh kind yet nervous, and Charlie simply a darling. Far from home and bruised from a love affair gone horribly wrong, Betty finds comfort in caring for the child, and warms to the attentions of handsome sailor Henrik, sometimes known as Red. Then, Charlie disappears. Suddenly a suspect in the eyes of both the media and the public, Betty must find the truth about what really happened that night, in order to clear her own name - and to find justice for the child she loves.

WINNER

Scot in a Trap by Catriona McPherson

Scot in a Trap (Last ditch mystery #5) by Catriona McPherson
Call Number: FIC MPHER CAT L5

ISBN: 9781448307852

Publication Date: 2023-06-29

A mysterious object the size of a suitcase, all wrapped in bacon and smelling of syrup, can mean only one thing: Thanksgiving at the Last Ditch Motel. This year the motel residents are in extra-celebratory mood as the holiday brings a new arrival to the group - a bouncing baby girl. But as one life enters the Ditch, another leaves it. Menzies Lassiter has only just checked in. When resident counselor Lexy Campbell tries to deliver his breakfast the next day, she finds him checked out. Permanently. Shocking enough if he was a stranger, but Lexy recognizes that face. Menzies was her first love until he broke her heart many years ago. What's he doing at the Last Ditch? What's he doing dead? And how can Lexy escape the fact that she alone had the means, the opportunity - and certainly the motive - to kill him?

NOMINEES:

A Streetcar Named Murder by T. G. Herren
Calypso, Corpses, and Cooking by Raquel V. Reyes
Bayou Book Thief by Ellen Byron
Death by Bubble Tea by Jennifer Chow

Calypso, Corpses, and Cooking (Caribbean kitchen mystery #2) by Raquel V. Reyes
Call Number: FIC REYES RAQV C2 (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781639101061

Publication Date: 2022-10-11

Fall festivities are underway in Coral Shores, Miami. Cuban-American cooking show star Miriam Quiñones-Smith wakes up to find a corpse in her front yard. The body by the fake tombstone is the woman that was kicked out of the school's Fall Festival the day before. Miriam's luck does not improve. Her passive-aggressive mother-in-law puts her in charge of the Women's Club annual gala. But this year, it's not canapes and waltzes. Miriam and her girlfriends-squad opt for fun and flavor. They want to spice it up with Caribbean food trucks and a calypso band. While making plans at the country club, they hear a volatile argument between the new head chef and the club's manager. Not long after, the chef swan dives to his death at the bottom of the grand staircase. Was it an accident? Or was it Beverly, the sous chef, who is furious after being passed over for the job? Or maybe it was his ex-girlfriend, Anastasia? Add two possible poisonings to the mix and Miriam is worried the food truck fun is going to be a major crash. As the clock ticks down and the body count goes up, Miriam's life is put in jeopardy. Will she connect the dots or die in the deep freeze? Foodies and mystery lovers alike will savor the denouement as the truth is laid bare in this simmering stew of rage, retribution, and murder.

WINNER

The Maid by Nita Prose

The Maid by Nita Prose
Call Number: FIC PROSE NIT M (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9780593356159

Publication Date: 2022-01-04

Molly Dunn is not like everyone else. She struggles with social skills and interprets people literally. Her gran used to interpret the world for her, codifying it into simple rules that Molly could live by. Since Gran died a few months ago, twenty-five-year-old Molly has had to navigate life's complexities all by herself. No matter--she throws herself with gusto into her work as a hotel maid. Her unique character, along with her obsessive love of cleaning and proper etiquette, make her an ideal fit for the job. She delights in donning her crisp uniform each morning, stocking her cart with miniature soaps and bottles, and returning guest rooms at the Regency Grand Hotel to a state of perfection. But Molly's orderly life is turned on its head the day she enters the suite of the infamous and wealthy Charles Black, only to find it in a state of disarray and Mr. Black himself very dead in his bed. Before she knows what's happening, Molly's odd demeanor has the police targeting her as their lead suspect and she finds herself in a web of subtext and nuance she has no idea how to untangle. Fortunately for Molly, a medley of friends she didn't realize she had refuses to let her be charged with murder--but will they be able to discover the real killer before it's too late?

NOMINEES:

Don't Know Tough by Eli Cranor
Shutter by Ramona Emerson
Devil's Chew Toy by Rob Osler
Bangalore Detectives Club by Harini Hagendra

Don't Know Tough by Eli Cranor
Call Number: FIC CRANO ELI DO

ISBN: 9781641293457

Publication Date: 2022-03-22

Trent Powers relocates his family from Anaheim to Arkansas to take over as head coach of the Denton Pirates, a high school football team powered by a volatile but talented running back named Billy Lowe. Billy comes from an extremely troubled home: a trailer park where he is terrorized by his unstable mother's abusive boyfriend. Billy takes out his anger on the field, and it's not long before he crosses a line. Instead of punishing him, though, Trent takes Billy into his home, hoping to protect his star player as the Pirates begin their playoff run. But when Billy's stepfather is found murdered, nothing can stop an explosive chain of violence that could tear the town apart.
Shutter by Ramona Emerson
Call Number: FIC EMERS RAM SH

ISBN: 9781641293334

Publication Date: 2022-08-02

Rita Todacheene is a forensic photographer working for the Albuquerque police force. Her excellent photography skills have cracked many cases-she is almost supernaturally good at capturing details. In fact, Rita has been hiding a secret: she sees the ghosts of crime victims who point her toward the clues that other investigators overlook. As a lone portal back to the living for traumatized spirits, Rita is terrorized by nagging ghosts who won't let her sleep and who sabotage her personal life. Her taboo and psychologically harrowing ability was what drove her away from her hometown on the Navajo reservation, where she was raised by her grandmother. It has isolated her from friends and gotten her in trouble with the law. And now it might be what gets her killed. When Rita is sent to photograph the scene of a supposed suicide on a highway overpass, the furious, discombobulated ghost of the victim-who insists she was murdered-latches onto Rita, forcing her on a quest for revenge against her killers, and Rita finds herself in the crosshairs of one of Albuquerque's most dangerous cartels. Written in sparkling, gruesome prose, Shutter is a blood-chilling debut from one of crime fiction's most powerful new voices.

WINNER

The Quarry Girls by Jess Lourey

The Quarry Girls by Jess Lourey
Call Number: FIC LOURE JES QU

ISBN: 9781542034296

Publication Date: 2022-11-01

Minnesota, 1977. For the teens of one close-knit community, summer means late-night swimming parties at the quarry, the county fair, and venturing into the tunnels beneath the city. But for two best friends, it's not all fun and games. Heather and Brenda have a secret. Something they saw in the dark. Something they can't forget. They've decided to never tell a soul. But their vow is tested when their friend disappears--the second girl to vanish in a week. And yet the authorities are reluctant to investigate. Heather is terrified that the missing girls are connected to what she and Brenda stumbled upon that night. Desperately searching for answers on her own, she learns that no one in her community is who they seem to be. Not the police, not the boys she met at the quarry, not even her parents. But she can't stop digging because she knows those girls are in danger. She also knows she's next.

NOMINEES:

Real Bad Things by Kelly J. Ford
Hush, Hush by Gabriel Valjan
Dead Drop James L'Etoile
In the Dark We Forget by Sandra S. G. Wong

Real Bad Things by Kelly J. Ford
Call Number: FIC FORD KELJ RE (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781662500091

Publication Date: 2022-09-01

When the body of her violent stepfather surfaces in the Arkansas River twenty-five years after his disappearance, Jane Mooney returns to Maud Bottoms to reckon with her past, and discovers some secrets are better left undisturbed.

WINNER

Enola Holmes and the Elegant Escapade by Nancy Springer

Enola Holmes and the Elegant Escapade (Enola Holmes #8) by Nancy Springer
Call Number: YA F SPR-N E8 (Young adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781250822970

Publication Date: 2022-09-06

Enola Holmes, Sherlock Holmes's younger sister and self-declared finder of lost persons and things, is determined to find her friend, Lady Cecily, a confused young Baronet's daughter on the run from her father's devious schemes.

NOMINEES:

The New Girl by Jesse Q. Sutanto
Daybreak on Raven Island by Fleur Bradley
Vanish Me by Lee Matthew Goldberg
#shedeservedit by Greg Herren
In Myrtle Peril by Elizabeth C. Bunce

Daybreak on Raven Island by Fleur Bradley
Call Number: JUV F BRA

ISBN: 9780593404638

Publication Date: 2022-08-23

Tori, Marvin, and Noah would rather be anywhere else than on the seventh-grade class field trip to Raven Island prison...But when the three of them stumble upon a dead body in the woods, miss the last ferry back home, and then have to spend the night on Raven Island, they find that they need each other now more than ever.
In Myrtle Peril (Myrtle Hardcastle Mystery 4) by Elizabeth C. Bunce
Call Number: JUV F BUN H4

ISBN: 9781616209216

Publication Date: 2022-10-04

Myrtle Hardcastle's search for a missing heiress, presumed lost at sea, runs aground when a murder in plain sight has no apparent victim.

WINNER

The Life of Crime : Detecting the History of Mysteries and Their Creators by Martin Edwards

The Life of Crime : detecting the history of mysteries and their creators by Martin Edwards
Call Number: 809.3872 E26L (Adult nonfiction)

ISBN: 9780008192426

Publication Date: 2022-05-26

In the first major history of crime fiction in fifty years, The Life of Crime: Detecting the History of Mysteries and their Creators traces the evolution of the genre from the eighteenth century to the present, offering brand-new perspective on the world's most popular form of fiction.

NOMINEES:

The Alaskan Blonde : Sex, Secrets, and the Hollywood Story That Shocked America by James Bartlett
Agatha Christie : an Elusive Woman by Lucy Worsley
Scoundrel : the True Story of the Murderer Who Charmed His Way to Fame and Freedom by Sarah Weinman
American Demon : Eliot Ness and the Hunt for America's Jack the Ripper by Daniel Stashower

Agatha Christie : an elusive woman by Lucy Worsley
Call Number: BIO CHRIS AGA W

ISBN: 9781639362523

Publication Date: 2022-09-06

She was born in 1890 into a world that had its own rules about what women could and couldn’t do. Lucy Worsley’s biography is not just of a massively, internationally successful writer. It's also the story of a person who, despite the obstacles of class and gender, became an astonishingly successful working woman. With access to personal letters and papers that have rarely been seen, Lucy Worsley’s biography is both authoritative and entertaining and makes us realize what an extraordinary pioneer Agatha Christie was—truly a woman who wrote the twentieth century.
Scoundrel : how a convicted murderer persuaded the women who loved him, the conservative establishment, and the courts to set him free by Sarah Weinman
Call Number: 364.152 W424s (Adult nonfiction)

ISBN: 9780062899767

Publication Date: 2022-02-22

From the author of The Real Lolita and editor of Unspeakable Acts, the astonishing story of a murderer who conned the people around him-including conservative thinker William F. Buckley-into helping set him free.
American Demon : Eliot Ness and the hunt for America's Jack the Ripper by Daniel Stashower
Call Number: 364.152 S796a (Adult nonfiction)

ISBN: 9781250041166

Publication Date: 2022-09-06

Boston had its Strangler. California had the Zodiac Killer. And in the depths of the Great Depression, Cleveland had the Mad Butcher of Kingsbury Run. On September 5th, 1934, a young beachcomber made a gruesome discovery on the shores of Cleveland’s Lake Erie: the lower half of a female torso, neatly severed at the waist. The victim, dubbed “The Lady of the Lake,” was only the first of a butcher’s dozen. Over the next four years, twelve more bodies would be scattered across the city. The bodies were dismembered with surgical precision and drained of blood. Some were beheaded while still alive. Terror gripped the city. Amid the growing uproar, Cleveland’s besieged mayor turned to his newly-appointed director of public safety: Eliot Ness. Ness had come to Cleveland fresh from his headline-grabbing exploits in Chicago, where he and his band of “Untouchables” led the frontline assault on Al Capone’s bootlegging empire. Now he would confront a case that would redefine his storied career.

WINNER

Crime Hits Home : a Collection of Stories from Crime Fiction's Top Authors edited by S. J. Rozan

Crime Hits Home : a collection of stories from crime fiction's top authors (Mysxtery Writers of America #3) by S. J. Rozan
Call Number: ANT CRIME HOM R (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781335425799

Publication Date: 2022-04-19

The newest anthology from Mystery Writers of America explores the theme of home and the crimes that endanger it, with stories by Ellen Hart, Naomi Hirahara, Walter Mosley, Sara Paretsky and more. Everyone comes from someplace. Everyone has somewhere they feel safe. Some people have found their home and are content where they are. Others feel trapped and yearn to go somewhere else. Many are somewhere else and yearn to go back. But evenin these safest of places, sometimes…crime hits home. What happens then? In this volume, MWA brings together some of today’s biggest crime writers—and some of our most exciting new talents—to consider this question. Each writer has defined home as they see fit: a place, a group, a feeling. The crime can come from without or within. What happens when crime hits home?

NOMINEES:

Lawyers, Guns, and Money : Crime Fictino Inspired by the Music of Warren Zevon edited by Libby Cudmore & Art Taylor
Low Down Dirty Vote : Volume 3 : the Color of My Vote edited by Mysti Berry
Paranoia Blues : Crime Fiction Inspired by the Songs of Paul Simon edited by Josh Pachter
Land of 10,000 Thrills : Bouchercon Anthology 2022 edited by Greg Herren

2024

WINNER

All the Sinners Bleed by S. A. Cosby

All the Sinners Bleed by S. A. Cosby
Call Number: FIC COSBY SA AL (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9781250831910

Publication Date: 2023-06-06

After years of working as an FBI agent, Titus Crown returns home to Charon County, the land of moonshine and cornbread, fist fights, and honeysuckle. Seeing his hometown struggling with a bigoted police force inspires him to run for sheriff. He wins and becomes the first Black sheriff in the history of the county. Then a year to the day after his election, a young Black man is fatally shot by Titus's deputies. Titus pledges to follow the truth wherever it leads. But no one expected he would unearth a serial killer who has been hiding in plain sight, haunting the dirt lanes and woodland clearings of Charon.

NOMINEES:

Everybody Knows by Jordan Harper
Face of Greed by James L'Etoile
Time's Undoing by Cheryl A. Head
The Last Devil to Die by Richard Osman

Everybody Knows by Jordan Harper
Call Number: FIC HARPE JOR EV

ISBN: 9780316457910

Publication Date: 2023-01-10

After her boss is gunned down at the Beverly Hills Hotel, Mae Pruett, a "black-bag" publicist working at LA's most powerful crisis PR firm protecting the rich and depraved, decides to investigate, running afoul of the whole system.
The Last Devil to Die (Thursday Murder Club #4) by Richard Osman
Call Number: FIC OSMAN RIC T4 (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9780593299425

Publication Date: 2023-09-19

It's rarely a quiet day for the Thursday Murder Club. Shocking news reaches them: an old friend has been killed, and a dangerous package he was protecting has gone missing. The gang's search leads them into the antiques business, where the tricks of the trade are as old as the objects themselves. As they encounter drug dealers, art forgers, and online fraudsters--as well as heartache close to home--Elizabeth, Joyce, Ron, and Ibrahim have no idea whom to trust.

WINNER

Mother-Daughter Murder Night by Nina Simon

Mother-Daughter Murder Night by Nina Simon
Call Number: FIC SIMON NIN MO

ISBN: 9780063315044

Publication Date: 2023-09-05

Nothing brings an estranged family together like a murder next door. High-powered businesswoman Lana Rubicon has a lot to be proud of: her keen intelligence, impeccable taste, and the L.A. real estate empire she's built. But when she finds herself trapped 300 miles north of the city, convalescing in a sleepy coastal town with her adult daughter Beth and teenage granddaughter Jack, Lana is stuck counting otters instead of square footage - and hoping that boredom won't kill her before cancer does. Then Jack - tiny in stature but fiercely independent - stumbles upon a dead body while kayaking near their bungalow. Jack quickly becomes a suspect in the homicide investigation, and the Rubicon women are thrown into chaos. Beth thinks Lana should focus on recovery, but Lana has a better idea. She'll pull on her wig, find the true murderer, protect her family, and prove she still has power. With Jack and Beth's help, Lana uncovers a web of lies, family vendettas, and land disputes lurking beneath the surface of a community populated by folksy conservationists and wealthy ranchers. But as their amateur snooping advances into ever-more dangerous territory, the headstrong Rubicon women must learn to do the one thing they've always resisted: depend on each other.

NOMINEES:

Scorched Grace by Margot Douaihy
City Under One Roof by Iris Yamashita
The Peacock and the Sparrow by I. S. Berry
Play the Fool by Lina Chern

City under One Roof by Iris Yamashita
Call Number: FIC YAMAS IRI CI (Adult fiction)

ISBN: 9780593336670

Publication Date: 2023-01-10

A stranded detective tries to solve a murder in a tiny Alaskan town where everyone winters in the same high-rise building, in this gripping debut by Academy Award-nominated screenwriter Iris Yamashita. When a local teenager discovers a severed hand and foot washed up on the shore of the small town of Point Mettier, Alaska, Cara Kennedy is on the case. A detective from Anchorage, she has her own reasons for investigating the possible murder in this isolated place, which can be accessed only by a tunnel. After an avalanche causes the tunnel to close indefinitely, Cara is stuck among the odd and suspicious residents of the town--all 205 of whom live in the same high-rise building and are as icy as the weather. Cara teams up with Point Mettier police officer Joe Barkowski, but before long the investigation is upended by a gang from a nearby reservation who are seeking shelter from the snowstorm. Cara soon discovers that everyone in this town is keeping secrets. If there is anything as elusive as the residents themselves, it's answers.
The Peacock and the Sparrow by I. S. Berry
Call Number: FIC BERRY JS PE

ISBN: 9781982194543

Publication Date: 2023-05-30

Stationed in Bahrain for his final tour, world-weary CIA spy Shane Collins is ready to return home until he meets a beautiful and enigmatic artist, but before he can win her love, he is caught in the crosshairs of a revolution and must use his skills to navigate a bloody uprising.

WINNER

Hide by Tracy Clark

Hide (Detective Harriet Foster #1) by Tracy Clark
Call Number: FIC CLARK TRA F1

ISBN: 9781542037570

Publication Date: 2023-01-01

When a young red-haired woman is found brutally murdered in downtown Chicago, one detail stands out: the red lipstick encircling her wrists and ankles. Detective Harriet Foster is on the case, even though she's still grieving the sudden death of her partner. As a Black woman in a male-dominated department, Foster anticipates a rocky road ahead acclimating to a new team--and building trust with her new partner isn't coming easily. After another victim turns up with the same lipstick markings, Foster suspects she's looking for a serial killer. Through a tip from a psychiatrist, Foster learns about Bodie Morgan: a troubled man with a twisted past and a penchant for pretty young redheads with the bluest eyes. As Foster wades into Morgan's sinister history, the killer continues their gruesome assault on Chicago's streets. In her desperate race to catch the murderer before they strike again, Foster will have to confront the darkest of secrets--including her own.

NOMINEES:

Because the Night by James D. F. Hannah
Lowdown Road by Scott Von Doviak
The Taken Ones by Jess Lourey
Magic City Blues by Bobby Mathews
No Home for Killers by E. A. Aymar

WINNER

Enola Holmes and the Mark of the Mongoose by Nancy Springer

Enola Holmes and the Mark of the Mongoose (Enola Holmes #9) by Nancy Springer
Call Number: YA F SPR-N H9

ISBN: 9781250885739

Publication Date: 2023-09-05

Enola Holmes, now independent and pursuing her profession as a scientific perditorian, joins forces with her brother Sherlock to solve the mysterious disappearance of Wolcott Balestier, a friend of Rudyard Kipling, as they uncover the ruthless world of book publishing and seek to bring him back safely.

NOMINEES:

The Sasquatch of Hawthorne Elementary by K. B. Jackson
Mystery of the Radcliffe Riddle by Taryn Souders
Myrtle, Means, and Opportunity by Elizabeth C. Bunce
Finney and the Secret Tunnel by Jamie Lane Barber

The Sasquatch of Hawthorne Elementary (Sasquatch hunters #1) by K. B. Jackson
Call Number: JUV F JAC S1

ISBN: 9781478868521

Publication Date: 2022-11-15

Twelve-year-old Jake Nelson and his mom, a former Disney Princess, have recently moved from Orlando, Florida, to his grandfather's home in Washington State. Shorter than the average sixth grader, Jake finds it difficult to fit in at his new school, Hawthorne Elementary, especially after making an enemy of one of the most popular boys on the very first day. Not to mention, Jake's hobby is a little unusual: He's a Sasquatch hunter.
Myrtle, Means, and Opportunity (Myrtle Hardcastle Mystery 5) by Elizabeth C. Bunce
Call Number: JUV F BUN H5

ISBN: 9781643753140

Publication Date: 2023-10-24

Twelve-year-old Myrtle Hardcastle's plans to bring her father and governess together are jeopardized when she investigates a murder and cursed treasure on a Scottish Island, and finds herself being hunted by another who will stop at nothing to find the treasure for themselves

WINNER

A Fever in the Heartland : the Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them by TImothy Egan

A Fever in the Heartland : the Ku Klux Klan's plot to take over America, and the woman who stopped them by Timothy Egan (Contribution by)
Call Number: 322.42 E29f (Adult nonfiction)

ISBN: 9780735225268

Publication Date: 2023-04-04

The Roaring Twenties -- the Jazz Age -- has been characterized as a time of Gatsby frivolity. But it was also the height of the uniquely American hate group, the Ku Klux Klan. Their domain was not the old Confederacy, but the Heartland and the West. They hated Blacks, Jews, Catholics, and immigrants in equal measure, and took radical steps to keep these people from the American promise. And the man who set in motion their takeover of great swaths of America was a charismatic charlatan named D.C. Stephenson. Stephenson was a magnetic presence whose life story changed with every telling. Within two years of his arrival in Indiana, he'd become the Grand Dragon of the state and the architect of the strategy that brought the group out of the shadows - their message endorsed from the pulpits of local churches, spread at family picnics and town celebrations. Judges, prosecutors, ministers, governors, and senators across the country all proudly proclaimed their membership. But at the peak of his influence, it was a seemingly powerless woman - Madge Oberholtzer - who would reveal his secret cruelties, and whose deathbed testimony finally brought the Klan to their knees.

NOMINEES:

Agatha Christie, She Watched : One Woman's Plot to Watch 201 Agatha Christie Movies Without Murdering the Director, Screenwriter, Cast, or Her Husband by Teresa Peschel
Love Me Fierce in Danger : the Life of James Ellroy by Steven Powell
Fallen Angel : the Life of Edgar Allan Poe by Robert Morgan
Finders : Justice, Faith, and Identity in Irish Crime Fiction by Anjili Babbar
A Mystery of Mysteries : the Death and Life of Edgar Allan Poe by Mark Dawidziak
Spillane : King of Pulp Fiction by James L. Traylor & Max Allan Collins

Agatha Christie, She Watched : one woman's plot to watch 201 Christie adaptations without murdering the director, screenwriter, cast or her husband by Teresa Peschel
Call Number: 791.4362 MYS PESCH A

ISBN: 9781950347391

Publication Date: 2023-04-01

Care to match wits with Hercule Poirot? Take tea and gossip with Miss Marple? Chase spies with Tommy and Tuppence? Agatha Christie, She Watched will introduce you to must-see movies (and must-avoid dogs) that depict the hopeful and dark sides of human nature. These movies will tantalize you, mystify you, and make you laugh at the folly of humanity. For more than a century, Agatha Christie has been thrilling readers with her classic mystery stories as well as dark thrillers that explore the heart of evil such as And Then There Were None and Endless Night. Christie has also been a huge part of the world's movie and television culture with more than 200 adaptations made from her stories. Teresa Peschel watched and reviewed 201 adaptations, from the German silent movie Adventures, Inc. (1929) to See How They Run and Why Didn't They Ask Evans? (2022). Each one was rated for fidelity to the original material and its overall quality. Each review takes up two pages and is accompanied by a banner image, six cast photos, a list of the major actors, the locations where they were filmed. Foreign movies with English subtitles from India, France, Russia, China, Japan, and Germany are also represented. Finally, there are eight movies in which the fictional Agatha Christie appears. Watch her debate Hercule Poirot about killing him in Curtain, battle a space wasp with Doctor Who, and plot to kill her husband's mistress. Agatha Christie, She Watched is the only comprehensive collection of reviews about Agatha Christie adaptations. Use it to find the movies made from the novels and stories you love, fill in your movie collection, or hold an Agatha Christie festival of your own. Learn why Christie's stories of passion and pain still grip the imaginations of her readers.
Love Me Fierce in Danger : the life of James Ellroy by Steven Powell
Call Number: BIO ELLRO JAM P

ISBN: 9781501367311

Publication Date: 2023-02-09

The first biography of James Ellroy, telling the extraordinary story of his lifelong obsessions with crime, sex, and America's secret history.
Fallen Angel : the life of Edgar Allan Poe by Robert Morgan
Call Number: BIO POE EDGA M

ISBN: 9780807180457

Publication Date: 2023-11-15

Over 170 years after his death, Edgar Allan Poe remains a figure of enduring fascination and speculation for readers, scholars, and devotees of the weird and macabre. In Fallen Angel, acclaimed novelist and poet Robert Morgan offers a new biography of this gifted, complicated author. Focusing on Poe's personal relationships, Morgan chronicles how several women influenced his life and art. Eliza Poe, his mother, died before he turned three, but she haunted him ever after. The loss of Elmira Royster Shelton, his first and last love, devastated him and inspired much of his poetry. Morgan shows that Poe, known for his gothic and supernatural writing, was also a poet of the natural world who helped invent the detective story, science fiction, analytical criticism, and symbolist aesthetics. Though he died at age forty, Poe left behind works of great originality and vision that Fallen Angel explores with depth and feeling.
Finders : justice, faith, anad identity in Irish crime fiction (Irish studies) by Anjili Babbar
Call Number: 823.0872 BABBA F

ISBN: 9780815611578

Publication Date: 2023-03-15

Irish detectives are idiosyncratic characters, conforming neither to obsolete, stereotypical crime fiction devices nor to sentimentalized notions of Irishness engendered by the American imagination and popular culture representations. As these detectives attempt to reconcile and evaluate standards of religious and legal justice, assessing and ranking their value in a search for absolutes to incorporate in the basis of their own, individual systems, Irish noir makes use of heritage and genre in the establishment of a new approach: one which considers what it means to be both an individual and the product of social systems, both acculturated and globalized, both affected by the past and assuming a role in progress, both aware of imperfections of the self and the world and desirous of having a positive impact.
A Mystery of Mysteries : the death and life of Edgar Allan Poe by Mark Dawidziak
Call Number: BIO POE EDGA D

ISBN: 9781250792495

Publication Date: 2023-02-14

A Mystery of Mysteries is a brilliant biography of Edgar Allan Poe that examines the renowned author's life through the prism of his mysterious death and its many possible causes. It is a moment shrouded in horror and mystery. Edgar Allan Poe died on October 7, 1849, at just forty, in a painful, utterly bizarre manner that would not have been out of place in one of his own tales of terror. What was the cause of his untimely death, and what happened to him during the three missing days before he was found, delirious and "in great distress" on the streets of Baltimore, wearing ill-fitting clothes that were not his own? Mystery and horror. Poe, who remains one of the most iconic of American writers, died under haunting circumstances that reflect the two literary genres he took to new heights. Over the years, there has been a staggering amount of speculation about the cause of death, from rabies and syphilis to suicide, alcoholism, and even murder. But many of these theories are formed on the basis of the caricature we have come to associate with Poe: the gloomy-eyed grandfather of Goth, hunched over a writing desk with a raven perched on one shoulder, drunkenly scribbling his chilling masterpieces. By debunking the myths of how he lived, we come closer to understanding the real Poe-and uncovering the truth behind his mysterious death, as a new theory emerges that could prove the cause of Poe's death was haunting him all his life. In a compelling dual-timeline narrative alternating between Poe's increasingly desperate last months and his brief but impactful life, Mark Dawidziak sheds new light on the enigmatic master of macabre.
Spillane : king of pulp fiction by Max Allan Collins; James L. Traylor
Call Number: BIO SPILL MIC C (Adult biography)

ISBN: 9781613163795

Publication Date: 2023-02-07

Beginning in 1947 with I, the Jury, and continuing with his next six novels, Spillane quickly amassed a readership in the tens of millions, becoming the bestselling novelist in the history of American publishing. Surrounded by controversy for the overt violence and suggestive sexual content of his iconic Mike Hammer private eye novels, Spillane was loathed by critics but beloved by his readers. There is, however, more to Spillane's life than the books. He also starred as Hammer in a movie, was a circus performer, worked with the FBI in capturing a notorious criminal, and starred in Miller Light beer commercials that were so popular they ran for a quarter of a century. Max Allan Collins became Spillane's friend and collaborator, continuing the Mike Hammer series for years after the author's death, building upon unfinished manuscripts the writer left behind. Now, with co-author James Traylor, Collins has produced the first comprehensive and authoritative profile of the Mystery Writers of America Grand Master.

WINNER

Killin' Time in San Diego edited by Holly West

Killin' Time in San Diego : Boucheron Anthology 2023 by Holly West (Editor)
Call Number: ANT BOUCH ANT 2023

ISBN: 9781643963280

Publication Date: 2023-08-01

Welcome to San Diego, where the perpetual sunshine blurs the line between good and evil, and sin and redemption are two sides of the same golden coin. Killin' Time in San Diego is a gripping anthology edited by Holly West, featuring twenty of today's best crime and mystery writers. Published in conjunction with Bouchercon 2023, this new anthology peels back the postcard-perfect image of San Diego to expose its darker side. With contributions from C.J. Box and the Edgar-award-winning author Naomi Hirahara, plus a new story from Ann Cleeves OBE, published for the first time in the U.S., Killin' Time in San Diego showcases an impressive lineup of writers, including Mary Keenan, C.W. Blackwell, J.R. Sanders, John M. Floyd, Kathy A. Norris, Kathleen L. Asay, L.H. Dillman, Richie Narvaez, Wesley Browne, Désirée Zamorano, James Thorpe, Kim Keeline, Victoria Weisfeld, Anne-Marie Campbell, Jennifer Berg, Tim P. Walker, and Emilya Naymark. From the haunted hallways of the Hotel del Coronado to the tranquil gardens of Balboa Park, from the opulent estates of La Jolla to the bustling Gaslamp Quarter, Killin' Time in San Diego is your ticket to the hidden side of "America's Finest City."

NOMINEES:

Here in the Dark : Stories edited by Meagan Lucas
School of Hard Knox : Stories that Break Father Ronald Knox's Ten Commandments edited by Donna Andrews, Greg Herren, & Art Taylor
The Adventure of the Castle Thief and Other Expeditions and Indiscretions edited by Art Taylor
Happiness is a Warm Gun : Crime Fiction Inspired by the Songs of the Beatles edited by Josh Pachter

2025

WINNER

The God of the Woods by Liz Moore

The God of the Woods by Liz Moore
Call Number: FIC MOORE LIZ GO

ISBN: 9780593418918

Publication Date: 2024-07-02

When Barbara Van Laar is discovered missing from her summer camp bunk one morning in August 1975, it triggers a panicked, terrified search. Losing a camper is a horrific tragedy under any circumstances, but Barbara isn't just any camper: she's the daughter of the wealthy family who owns the camp--as well as the opulent nearby estate, and most of the land in sight. And this isn't the first time a Van Laar child has disappeared in this region. Barbara's older brother also went missing 16 years earlier, never to be found. How could this have happened yet again? Out of this gripping beginning, Liz Moore weaves a ... textured drama, both emotionally nuanced and propelled by a double-barreled mystery.

NOMINEES:

Missing White Woman by Kelly Garrett
The Grey Wolf by Louise Penny
Alter Ego by Alex Segura
California Bear by Duane Swierczynski

The Grey Wolf (Chief Inspector Gamache #19) by Louise Penny
Call Number: FIC PENNY LOU G19

ISBN: 9781250328137

Publication Date: 2024-10-29

Relentless phone calls interrupt the peace of a warm August morning in Three Pines. Though the tiny Québec village is impossible to find on any map, someone has managed to track down Armand Gamache, head of homicide at the Sûreté, as he sits with his wife in their back garden. Reine-Marie watches with increasing unease as her husband refuses to pick up, though he clearly knows who is on the other end. When he finally answers,his rage shatters the calm of their quiet Sunday morning. A missing coat, an intruder alarm, a note for Gamache reading "this might interest you", a puzzling scrap of paper with a mysterious list-and then a murder. All propel Chief Inspector Gamache and his team toward a terrible realization. Something much more sinister than any one murder or any one case is fast approaching. Armand Gamache, Jean-Guy Beauvoir, his son-in-law and second in command, and Inspector Isabelle Lacoste can only trust each other, as old friends begin to act like enemies, and long-time enemies appear to be friends. Determined to track down the threat before it becomes a reality, their pursuit takes them across Québec and across borders. Their hunt grows increasingly desperate, even frantic, as the enormity of the creature they're chasing becomes clear. If they fail the devastating consequences would reach into the largest of cities and the smallest of villages. Including Three Pines.

WINNER

The Murder of Mr. Ma by S. J. Rozan & John Shen Yen Nee

NOMINEES:

The Lantern's Dance by Laurie R. King
The Witching Hour by Catriona McPherson
The Bootlegger's Daughter by Nadine Nettmann
The Courtesan Pirate by Nina Wachsman

The Lantern's Dance (Mary Russell & Sherlock Holmes #18) by Laurie R. King
Call Number: FIC KING LAUR R18

ISBN: 9780593496596

Publication Date: 2024-02-13

Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes, hoping for a respite in the French countryside, are instead caught up in a case that turns both bewildering and intensely personal. After their recent adventures in Transylvania, Russell and Holmes look forward to spending time with Holmes' son, the famous artist Damian Adler, and his family. But when they arrive at Damian's house, they discover that the Adlers have fled from a mysterious threat. Holmes rushes after Damian while Russell, slowed down by a recent injury, stays behind to search the empty house. In Damian's studio, she discovers four crates packed with memorabilia related to Holmes' grand-uncle, the artist Horace Vernet. It's an odd mix of treasures and clutter, including a tarnished silver lamp with a rotating shade: an antique yet sophisticated form of zoetrope, fitted with strips of paper whose images dance with the lantern's spin. In the same crate is an old journal written in a nearly impenetrable code. Intrigued, Russell sets about deciphering the intricate cryptograph, slowly realizing that each entry is built around an image -- the first of which is a child, bundled into a carriage by an abductor, watching her mother recede from view. Russell is troubled, then entranced, but each entry she decodes brings more questions. Who is the young woman who created this elaborate puzzle? What does she have to do with Damian, or the Vernets-or the threat hovering over the house? The secrets of the past appear to be reaching into the present. And it seems increasingly urgent that Russell figure out how the journal and lantern are related to Damian -- and possibly to Sherlock Holmes himself. Could there be things about his history that even the master detective does not perceive?

WINNER

A New Lease on Death by Olivia Blacke

A New Lease on Death : a mystery by Olivia Blacke
Call Number: FIC BLACK OLI NE

ISBN: 9781250336675

Publication Date: 2024-10-29

Ruby Young's new Boston apartment comes with all the usual perks. Windows facing the brick wall of the next-door building. Heat that barely works. A malfunctioning buzzer. Noisy neighbors. A dead body on the sidewalk outside. And of course, a ghost. Since Cordelia Graves died in her apartment a few months ago, she's kept up her residency, despite being bored out of her (non-tangible) skull and frustrated by her new roommate. When her across-the-hall neighbor, Jake Macintyre, is shot and killed in an apparent mugging gone wrong outside their building, Cordelia is convinced there's more to it and is determined to bring his killer to justice. Unfortunately, Cordelia, being dead herself, can't solve the mystery alone. She has to enlist the help of the obnoxiously perky, living tenant of her apartment. Ruby is twenty, annoying, and has never met a houseplant she couldn't kill. But she also can do everything Cordelia can't, from interviewing suspects to researching Jake on the library computers that go up in a puff of smoke if Cordelia gets too close. The roommates form an unlikely friendship as they get closer to the truth about Jake's death...and maybe other dangerous secrets as well.

NOMINEES:

Five Furry Familiars by Lynn Cahoon
Exposure by Ramona Emerson
Lights, Camera, Bones by Carolyn Haines
Death in a Ghostly Hue by Susan Van Kirk

Lights, Camera, Bones (Sarah Booth Delaney #27) by Carolyn Haines
Call Number: FIC HAINE CAR D27

ISBN: 9781250885944

Publication Date: 2024-05-21

Delaney Detective Agency gets a taste of the spotlight when they are called to a case on a movie set in Greenville, MS, right on the Mississippi River. Marlon Brandon, heir to a wealthy and influential political family, has brought a film crew to town to film a drama about the 1927 flood that submerged a great deal of Greenville. Marlon wants the world to know the story of the flood-and the heroic role the Brandon ancestors played in rescuing dozens of local residents from drowning. Or at least that was the plan until he disappeared. If this weren't concerning enough, the situation appears even more dire when a severed foot is discovered in the Mississippi River, and clues indicate that Marlon may have fallen victim to a freak bull shark attack. But as rumors swirl around the Delta about Marlon's motives for making the film, Sarah Booth and Tinkie have to wonder whether a shark is to blame, or an equally ferocious human offender. The show must go on, and Sarah Booth and her crew will have to investigate all manner of creatures, over land and sea, in order to solve the mystery and save the day.

WINNER

Cirque du Slay by Rob Osler

NOMINEES:

A Cup of Flour, A Pinch of Death by Valerie Burns
A Very Woodsy Murder by Ellen Byron
Ill-Fated Fortune by Jennifer J. Chow
Scotzilla by Catriona McPherson
Dominoes, Danzon, and Death by Raquel V. Reyes

A Very Woodsy Murder (Golden Motel #1) by Ellen Byron
Call Number: FIC BYRON ELL G1

ISBN: 9781496745354

Publication Date: 2024-07-23

Down-on-her-luck sitcom writer Dee Stern is flipping the script. Twice divorced and wasting her talents on an obnoxious kids' show, the lifelong Angeleno embraces the urge to jump in her car and keep driving. It's a road trip with no destination--until she pulls into a mid-century motel filled with cobwebs and retro charm. Nestled in the shadow of a national park. It's a time capsule of a place that, like her, could use some work. So, in the most impulsive move of her life, Dee teams up with her best freind, Jeff Cornetta--who happens to be her first ex-husband--to transform the aging ranch into the Golden Motel-of-the-Mountains, a hiker's oasis on the edge of the wilderness... But Dee and Jeff soon realize there couldn't be two people more unprepared for the hospitatlity business. There's also the panic-inducing reality of prowling bears and a general store as the only shopping spot for miles. Living and working in the middle of no-where takes some getting used to--especially when a disrespectful guest ends up murdered! Now, with the motel duo topping the suspect list, Dee must steer clear of a meddling park ranger, face her past in show biz, and determine if the killer is a local or tourist. Because as she quickly finds out, there are many thihngs worse than a one-star review.
Ill-Fated Fortune (Magical fortune cookie #1) by Jennifer J. Chow
Call Number: FIC CHOW JENJ M1

ISBN: 9781250323033

Publication Date: 2024-02-20

Felicity Jin grew up hanging onto Mom's apron strings in their magical bakery in the quaint town of Pixie, California. Her mother's enchanted baked goods, including puffy pineapple buns and creamy egg tarts, bring instant joy to all who consume them. Felicity has always been hesitant in the kitchen herself after many failed attempts, but a takeout meal gone wrong inspires her to craft some handmade fortune cookies. They become so popular that Felicity runs out of generic fortunes and starts making personalized predictions. When one customer's ill-fated fortune results in his murder, Felicity's suspiciously specific fortune has the police focusing on her as the main culprit. Now Felicity must find a way to turn her luck around and get cleared from suspicion.

WINNER

You Know What You Did by K. T. Nguyen

You Know What You Did by K. T. Nguyen
Call Number: FIC NGUYE KT YO

ISBN: 9780593473856

Publication Date: 2024-04-16

Annie "Anh Le" Shaw grew up poor, but seems to have it all now: a dream career, a stunning home, and a devoted husband and daughter. When Annie's mother, a Vietnam War refugee, dies suddenly one night, Annie's carefully curated life begins to unravel. Her obsessive-compulsive disorder, which she thought she'd vanquished years ago, comes roaring back--but this time, the disturbing fixations swirling around in Annie's brain might actually be coming true. A prominent art patron disappears, and the investigation zeroes in on Annie. Spiraling with self-doubt, she distances herself from her family and friends, only to wake up in a hotel room--naked, next to a lifeless body. The police have more questions, but with her mind increasingly fractured, Annie doesn't have answers. All she knows is this: She will do anything to protect her daughter--even if it means losing herself.

NOMINEES:

The Mechanics of Memory by Audrey Lee
Ghosts of Waikiki by Jennifer K. Morita
Good Looking Ugly by Rob D. Smith
Holy City by Henry Wise

Holy City by Henry Wise
Call Number: FIC WISE HEN HO

ISBN: 9780802162915

Publication Date: 2024-06-04

No one innocent. No one free. Nothing sacred. After a decade of exile precipitated by the tragic death of his mother, Will Seems returns home from Richmond to rural Southern Virginia, taking a job as deputy sheriff in a landscape given way to crime and defeat. Impoverished and abandoned, this remote land of tobacco plantations, razed forests, and boarded-up homes seems stuck in the past in a state that is trying to forget its complex history and move on. Will's efforts to go about his life are wrecked when a mysterious, brutal homicide claims the life of an old friend, Tom Janders, forcing Will to face the true impetus for his return: not to honor his mother's memory, but to pay a debt to a Black friend who, in an act of selfless courage years ago, protected Will and suffered permanent disfigurement for it. Meanwhile, a man Will knows to be innocent is arrested for Tom's murder, and despite Will's pleas, his boss seems all too content wrap up the case and move on. Will must weigh his personal guilt against his public duty when the local Black community hires Bennico Watts, an unpredictable private detective from Richmond, to help him find the real killer. It would seem an ideal pairing-she has experience, along with plenty of sand, and Will is privy to the details of the case-but it doesn't take long for either to realize they much prefer to operate alone. Bennico and Will clash as they each defend their nontraditional ways on a wild ride that wends deep into the Snakefoot, an underworld wilderness that for hundreds of years has functioned as a hideout for outcasts-the forgotten and neglected and abused-leaving us enmeshed in the tangled history of a region and its people that leaves no one innocent, no one free, nothing sacred.

WINNER

Echo by Tracy Clark

NOMINEES:

The Last Few Miles of Road by Eric Beetner
Served Cold by James L'Etoile
Late Checkout by Alan Orloff
The Big Lie by Gabriel Valjan

WINNER

When Mimi Went Missing by Suja Sukumar

NOMINEES:

Big Grey Man of Ben MacDhui by K. B. Jackson
The Sasquatch of Harriman Lake by K. B. Jackson
First Week Free at the Roomy Toilet by Josh Pachter
The Sherlock Society by James Ponti

The Big Grey Man of Ben MacDhui (Sasquatch Hunters #3) by K. B. Jackson; Lorenzo Conti (Illustrator)
Call Number: JUV F JAC S3

ISBN: 9781478882237

Publication Date: 2024-11-05

The Sasquatch Hunters are at it again. Jake, Jasmine, and Lanny, with Benny in tow, are visiting Scotland over Christmas. They're excited about maybe glimpsing the Loch Ness Monster, but Jake is even more excited about the Big Grey Man, an elusive figure said to haunt the peak of Ben MacDhui. Will the gang get a glimpse of the Big Grey Man? And even more important, will the hunt for the Grey Man Distract Jake from his parents' impending remarriage?
The Sasquatch of Harriman Lake (Sasquatch hunters #2) by K. B. Jackson; Lorenzo Conti (Illustrator)
Call Number: JUV F JAC S2

ISBN: 9781478868095

Publication Date: 2024-02-20

Everything Jake Nelson has wished for is coming true. He's finally getting to know his long-lost father, school is a lot less scary with best friends Jasmine and Lanny, and their company, Sasquatch Hunters of Washington, Inc., is taking off. When Jasmine's father invites everyone to a long weekend at their cabin on Harriman Lake, the kids jump at the chance. Legend has it that there is a treasure buried somewhere in the woods nearby, and the "hairy man" the lake is named after might be a Sasquatch. But the deeper they dive into their investigation, tricky puzzles, mysterious locals, and new friendships threaten to break the group apart. Jake may be able to follow the treasure's clues, but will he lose something even more valuable along the way?
First Week Free at the Roomy Toilet (June Knight mystery #1) by Josh Pachter
Call Number: YA F PAC-J K1

ISBN: 9781685127404

Publication Date: 2024-09-24
The Sherlock Society (Sherlock Society #1) by James Ponti
Call Number: JUV F PON S1

ISBN: 9781665932530

Publication Date: 2024-09-03

Twelve-year-old Alex Sherlock, his thirteen-year-old sister Zoe, and their friends Lina and Yadi decide to spend their summer in Miami investigating the many "cold cases" their grandfather accumulated during his years as a reporter--first up, Al Capone and a buried treasure.

WINNER

The Serial Killer's Apprentice by Katherine Ramsland & Tracy Ullman

The Serial Killer's Apprentice by Katherine Ramsland; Tracy Ullman
Call Number: 364.152 SER RAMSL S

ISBN: 9781613164952

Publication Date: 2024-04-16

Elmer Wayne Henley, Jr. was only fourteen when he first became entangled with serial rapist and murderer Dean Corll in 1971. Fellow Houston, Texas, teenager David Brooks had already been ensnared by the charming older man, bribed with cash to help lure boys to Corll's home. When Henley unwittingly entered the trap, Corll sensed he'd be of more use as a second accomplice than another victim. He baited Henley with the same deal he'd given Brooks: $200 for each boy they could bring him. Henley didn't understand the full extent of what he had signed up for at first. But once he started, Corll convinced him that he had crossed the line of no return and had to not only procure boys but help kill them and dispose of the bodies, as well. When Henley first took a life, he lost his moral base. He felt doomed. By the time he was seventeen, he'd helped with multiple murders and believed he'd be killed, too. But on August 8, 1973, he picked up a gun and shot Corll. When he turned himself in, Henley showed police where he and Brooks had buried Corll's victims in mass graves. Twenty-eight bodies were recovered--most of them boys from Henley's neighborhood--making this the worst case of serial murder in America at the time. The case reveals gross failures in the way cops handled parents' pleas to look for their missing sons and how law enforcement possibly protected a larger conspiracy. The Serial Killer's Apprentice tells the story of Corll and his accomplices in its fullest form to date. It also explores the concept of "mur-dar" (the predator's instinct for exploitable kids), current neuroscience about adolescent brain vulnerabilities, the role of compartmentalization, the dynamic of a murder apprenticeship, and how tales like Henley's can aid with early intervention. Despite his youth and cooperation, Henley went to trial and received six life sentences. He's now sixty-five and has a sense of perspective about how adult predators can turn formerly good kids into criminals. Unexpectedly, he's willing to talk. This book is his warning and the story of the unspeakable evil and sorrow that befell Houston in the early 1970s.

NOMINEES:

Writing the Cozy Mystery : Authors' Perspectives on Their Craft edited by Phyllis M. Betz
Some of My Best Friends Are Murderers : Critiquing the Colombo Killers by Chris Chan
On Edge : Gender and Genre in the Work of Shirley Jackson, Patricia Highsmith, and Leigh Brackett by Ashley Lawson
Abingdon's Boardinghouse Murder by Greg Lilly

Writing the Cozy Mystery : authors' persectives on their crafts by Phyllis M. Betz
Call Number: 808.3872 BETZ W

ISBN: 9781476690827

Publication Date: 2024-08-05

This book brings together essays written by a number of well-known writers of cozy mysteries, including Sherry Harris, Amanda Flower, Leslie Budewitz, and Edith Maxwell, among others, who provide insight into their approaches to writing. Topics covered include how they work with the form, develop characters and settings, and utilize the particular hook, skill or business that establishes the protagonist's ability to solve crimes. In addition to discussing these traditional aspects of writing, several authors focus on how they have expanded the direction the contemporary cozy mystery has taken with the inclusion of more diverse characters and social issues.
Some of My Best Friends Are Murderers : critiquing the Columbo killers (Chris Chan's nonfictino mystery criticism #2) by Chris Chan
Call Number: 791.4572 COL CHAN S

ISBN: 9781685127329

Publication Date: 2024-09-24

Can you enjoy a crime television show if you already know whodunit? As Columbo proved, definitely! In nearly every episode, Lieutenant Columbo, played by Peter Falk, is paired off against a murderer who'd supposedly committed the perfect crime. Columbo would question, trick, and even befriend the very different killers in order to make an arrest. But despite the standard formula for the episodes, each guest murderer was very different. This book will explore the killers who believed they were too clever to be caught, only to be undone by a detective who kept asking about just one more thing.
On Edge : gender and genre in the work of Shirley Jackson, Patricia Highsmith, and Leigh Brackettt by Ashley Lawson
Call Number: 813.5209 LAWSO ZO

ISBN: 9780814215746

Publication Date: 2024-09-21

Demonstrates how women writers, especially Shirley Jackson, Patricia Highsmith, and Leigh Brackett, made significant contributions via genre writing to the postwar American literary marketplace, merging literary realism with fantastical or exaggerated elements in order to respond to the big questions of their era, the 'Age of Anxiety.
Abingdon's Boardinghouse Murder (True crime) by Greg Lilly
Call Number: 364.1423 M ABING LA

ISBN: 9781467157322

Publication Date: 2024-05-20

On a bitter November night in 1945, a widow shot her young boarder, a WWII veteran, and left him to die on the floor of his room. Helen Clark tossed the gun under the neighbor's porch and then took a taxi to join her teen daughters at a movie in Bristol. When the body was found, after several conflicting statements, she settled on the claim that he shot himself-four times, twice in the back. The Commonwealth of Virginia called it murder in a jealous rage. The trial enthralled the nation. Local author Greg Lilly uses newspaper coverage of the murder, the investigation and the trial to reveal the facts of the Abingdon boardinghouse murder.

WINNER

Tales of Music Murder and Mayhem edited by Heather Graham

NOMINEES:

Murder Neat edited by Michael Bracken & Barb Goffman
Scattered Smothered Covered & Chunked edited by Michael Bracken & Stacy Woodson
Eight Very Bad Nights edited by Tod Goldberg
Friend of the Devil edited by Josh Pachter

Anthony Awards

2020

The Murder List by Hank Phillippi Ryan

One Night Gone by Tara Laskowski

The Alchemist's Illusion by Gigi Pandian

Seven Ways to Get Rid of Harry by Jen Conley

The Mutual Admiration Society: How Dorothy L. Sayers and her Oxford Circle Remade the World for Women by Mo Moulton

Malice Domestic 14: Mystery Most Edible edited by Verena Rose, Rita Owen, and Shawn Reilly

2021

Blacktop Wasteland by S. A. Cosby

FINALISTS:

What You Don't See by Tracy Clark

Little Secrets by Jennifer Hillier

And Now She's Gone by Rachel Howzell Hall

The First to Lie by Hank Phillipp Ryan

Winter Counts by David Heska Wanbli Weiden

FINALISTS:

Derailed by Mary Kellikoa

Murder in Old Bombay by Nev March

Murder at the Mena House by E. Neubauer

The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman

Unspeakable Things by Jess Lourey

FINALISTS:

The Fate of a Flapper by Susanna Calkins

When No One is Watching by Alyssa Cole

The Lucky One by Lori Rader-Day

Holly Hernandez and the Death of Disco by Richie Narvaez

FINALISTS:

Midnight at the Barclay Hotel by Fleur Bradley

Premeditated Myrtle by Elizabeth C. Bunce

From the Desk of Zoe Washington by Janae Marks

Star Wars Poe Dameron: Free Fall by Alex Segura

Unspeakable Acts: True Tales of Crime, Murder, Deceit, and Obsession by Sarah Weinman

FINALISTS:

Sometimes You Have to Lie by Leslie Brody

American Sherlock by Kate Winkler Dawson

Howdunit! edited by Martin Edwards

The Third Rainbow Girl by Emma Copley Eisenberg

Phantom Lady by Christina Lane

Shattering Glass: a Nasty Woman Press Anthology edited by Heather Graham

2022

WINNER

Razorblade Tears by S. A. Cosby

NOMINEES

Runner by Tracy Clark

Clark and Division by Naomi Hirahara

The Collective by Alison Gaylin

These Toxic Things by Rachel Howzell Hall

WINNER

Arsenic and Adobo by Mia P. Manansala

NOMINEES:

The Other Black Girl

Walking Through Needles

Her Name is Knight

All Her Little Secrets

WINNER

Bloodline by Jess Lourey

WINNER

I Play One on TV by Alan Orloff

NOMINEES

Enola Holmes and the Black Barouche by Nancy Springer

Cold-Blooded Myrtle by Elizabeth C. Bunce

Bury Me in Shadows by Greg Herren

The Forest of Stolen Girls by June Hur

WINNER

How to Write a Mystery : a Handbook from Mystery Writers of America by Lee Child and Laurie R. King

NOMINEES:

The Haunting of Alma Fielding

The Combat Zone : Murder, Race, and Boston's Struggle for Justice

Last Call : a True Story of Love, Lust, and Murder in Queer New York

Murder Book : a Graphic Memoir of a True Crime Obsession

WINNER

This Time for Sure : Bouchercon Anthology 2021

NOMINEES:

When a Stranger Comes to Town

Under the Thumb : Stories of Police Oppression

Trouble No More : Crime Fiction Inspired by Southern Rock and the Blues

Midnight Hour : a Chilling Anthology of Crime Fiction from 20 Acclaimed Authors of Color

2023

WINNER